


Complex

by frogs_of_war



Series: Complex [1]
Category: Wizarding World - Fandom
Genre: College, Demon, Family, Mpreg, Multi, University, Wizard, cat boy, familiar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-21
Updated: 2017-03-27
Packaged: 2018-10-08 23:05:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 20,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10398165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frogs_of_war/pseuds/frogs_of_war
Summary: Steele makes a move on the Junior he's had a crush on and it takes him further than he ever thought he'd go.





	1. One

Steele walked gently up to the bench where beautiful Dal wept. The compulsion to stay away was strong—Dal had belonged to a demon until just two weeks ago.

But Steele wasn’t going to let a little thing like that get between him and comforting the cutest Junior on campus. “Dal?”

Dal flinched then looked up through his wet lashes. “Sorry.”

He was so pretty.

Steele held up a hand but didn’t quite touch Dal. Dal leaned into him and changed into the prettiest, tiniest, speckled cat Steele had ever seen then climbed into his lap. Steele stroked him gentle until he calmed and insisted on less gentle caresses. Dal was purring, so he must be better.

So warm. Dal’s voice was a tickle in the back of his mind.

“We’ll be warmer inside.”

Cat-Dal looked up. You can understand me? But you aren’t a familiar.

Now how did pretty little Dal know anything about Steele? They’d only had one class together and Dal had withdrawn halfway through Western Swing Dance because his new demon boyfriend was a jealous fleabag. “I’m not a cat, but I can understand you.”

Cat-Dal butted his head against Steele’s chest. Take me inside.

“Baby, I’ll take you anywhere.”

Cat-Dal meowed. It couldn’t really be translated. Steele folded Dal’s clothes and put them in his backpack, then buttoned Cat-Dal into his jacket. Cat-Dal looked out his collar, then tucked himself inside.

Ash said it was a good thing that Steele had been bashful about asking Dal out two years ago as he would have been more hurt when the demon claimed Dal, but today they’d sent Steele pictures of Dal crying and told him where Dal was, so he’d thought they were okay with him going after Dal, but now they frowned at him from the corner of the Demon Studies building and wouldn’t respond to his nods their way.

Steele wasn’t asking them to breaking up with the demon who was perusing them. Akakios was nothing like Hezekiel, the demon who’d kept Dal cloistered when he wasn’t in class, picked which classes Dal was allowed to attend, and sometimes sat behind him in those classes. A TA or two had tried to intervene, but demons were allowed to do what they pleased with their mates.

That was something that should really be changed.

~~~~~~

Steele opened his jacket when he got to his room. Cat-Dal jumped out and sniffed around the bed. Steele, being a senior, had a single which was almost as big as the doubles on the floor below and it had its own tiny bathroom with a little shower stall. He opened his backpack, got out Dal’s clothes, and set them on his pillow. He turned to put his books away. He had a essay due the day after tomorrow, and an exam the day after that.

When he’d given Dal enough time to get dressed, if he chose to, Steele turned around. Dal sat on the bed in unfastened jeans, playing with his shirt. Steele took his time soaking in the sight.

Dal blushed, bringing color to his pale cheeks.

Steele sat down in his desk chair. “Hungry?”

He had some granola bars stashed somewhere.

Dal pulled his shirt against his chest. “What do you know? About me?”

“Besides that you’re the prettiest Junior on campus?”

Dal bit his lower lip, but the corners curved up. Steele wanted to kiss him. Bad. But bandages where best taken off quickly. “I know Hezekiel treated you abysmally.” And that was before the unprecedented breakup. Demon’s never broke with their Mates. “I think everyone does.”

Tears poured down Dal’s face. “He made me… But I loved him anyway. Why did I love him? Why does it hurt?”

Steele rolled his chair over and held out a box of tissues. Dal thanked him and took the box. Then he ranted and paced the room, laying out two years worth of horrible treatment. Steele sucked mints to keep his teeth from clinching and his kept having to slide his fingers under his thighs to keep from reaching out. This was Dal’s time.

Dal’s tears dried up, but he kept a fresh tissue in his fist. “But you know the worst part?”

“Worse than all you’ve said?”

“She’s so nice. She sat down beside me, took my hand as if I were her good friend, and asked if I was pregnant.”

“She? His new lover?”

After two years of dating in the most controlling sense of the word, Hezekiel had claimed the Mate thing was all a mistake, he’d just met his real Mate and dumped Dal.

“I held out. How bad he’d treated me.” Dal wiped at his wet eyes. “All those lies just to be dumped. I was his Mate, then I was nothing.”

“He still has a compulsion to stay away on you.” It was strong, but Steele was stronger. He hadn’t gotten his name by being a wuss.

“Aggh!” Dal pounded on the bed. “No wonder I have no friends. I will never, never ever forgive him.”

Dal flopped forward. “But she was so sweet and gentle and I cried for the first time. Now the tears won’t quit.”

Steele laid a hand on Dal’s back. Was it all right to touch him now? Steele just couldn’t help himself. “I don’t mind the tears.”

Dal rose into his arms and held tight. “You don’t mind the compulsion?”

“I’m not going to let some idiotic and jealous mutt of a demon come between me and a friend.”

Dal licked his very kissable lips. “You’re not scared.”

“I’ve got friends with demon lovers. None that are even close to how bad your was, but.” He got down on his knees, so he was looking up at Dal. “If you hadn’t withdrawn from that class, I would have made you mine, demon boyfriend or no demon boyfriend.”

Dal grinned. He was really pretty.

And his kiss was really sweet too.

~~~~~

After his last class of the day, Steele stopped at Gabe’s. He needed to pick up dinner and see if Dal was still in his room, but safety came first.

Gabe’s boyfriend, Bene, opened the door. “You smell like sex.”

Demons had an excellent sense of smell and no social pressure to keep what they smelled to themselves. Steele just shook his head. “Takes one to know one. Gabe, do you still have any of your Tactile 3000s?”

Gabe made sex toys that worked on demons. Bondage and S&M had to be specialized to the species. Gabe laughed. “A new guy? Shouldn’t you start with vanilla?”

Steele’s entire college career was one night stands. He never got further than vanilla. But now…

Bene leaned closer. “Demon, but not demon.”

This would be easier without Bene. “Gabe, you know that guy I’ve been mooning over since Sophomore year?”

Gabe grinned. “You get him?” Then he frowned. “Doesn’t he belong to a demon?”

Bene perked up. He was just as controlling and jealous as all other demon—it was their nature—but he hid it better than the stupid ones.

“Not anymore. Hezekiel said it was all a mistake. Dal wasn’t really his Mate after all.”

“What!” Bene rose to his full height and his human skin slipped off.

Steele shrugged. “He met someone else.”

Gabe bit the side of his lip. “That’s not the way it works.”

“That’s how it worked this time.”

Gabe looked a Bene, who shrunk as he slid to his knees. He looked pleadingly up at Gabe. “I know you are my Mate. The only one I’ll ever love.”

Gabe rested his forehead against Bene’s. “I trust you. You wouldn’t lie about something so important.”

But Steele wasn’t sure Hezekiel had lied.


	2. Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hezekiel did the right thing, didn't he, when he broke up with the one who couldn't be his Mate, now that he'd met his real Mate? But then why does he miss him so much and need him so badly?

  
Hezekiel stormed through the dorm. People were staring, but he didn’t care. He had to get to Doll. Just because he wasn’t Hezekiel’s Mate, didn’t mean Hezekiel didn’t care about him. He cared a lot. More than he should, considering how wrong he’d been about the Mate thing. Those two years had meant something.

He followed Doll’s faint scent to a demon shielded dorm on the very top floor. Who would do that? Doll was his!

Hezekiel pounded on the door. “Open up. Doll! Open this door.”

Noise sounded in the room, but no matter how long or hard Hezekiel knocked, the footsteps never got closer. Who had dared shield the dorm against Hezekiel? Did they know Hezekiel’s Mate was in there?

An eon later the door open just enough to let a non-demon step out and close the door behind him. The guy was dark skinned with weird stripes in his dark hair. Super weird stripes, not a section of one color and a section of another, but every individual hair striped with two thin bands of white the exact same distance from the tip of each hair. He was a little taller than Hezekiel, but looked twice as heavy. Someone could use a diet. “You can’t get in and Dal won’t be able to hear your knocks or shouts. You might as well leave.”

Hezekiel swelled to his full height and muscles. He gathered his full demon voice. “Bring Doll to me.”

The fool didn’t even flinch. He looked Hezekiel over and sighed. “Like I said, you can’t get in.”

Hezekiel threw his power against the door, and by proxy, the idiot. Neither so much as sighed.

“My dorm is spelled against you,” said the idiot.

“By a demon?” Hezekiel tested the door and then the wall beside it. “Who would dare keep me from my Mate?”

The idiot grinned. “He’s not your Mate, now is he? And some fellow demons didn’t like your behavior.”

“Doll is still mine.”

“Yell at the wall.” The idiot shrugged. “Whatever makes you happy. But Dal can’t hear you.”

Hezekiel would get the door open and if he couldn’t do it himself, he would get the idiot to do the deed. He grinned and backed the idiot against the door, but the idiot just shrugged past him. Wherever the idiot touched him burned.

“What?”

The idiot turned at the top of the stairs. “I’m charmed against you. You can’t touch me or Dal without getting hurt.”

Hezekiel looked down at his arm. He was getting blisters! What could cause that? How to stop it? And why did it hurt so much? Demon’s healed quickly, but the blisters were getting bigger.

He held his arm against his side and turned to the far stairs. “You haven’t heard the last of me.”

As he hurried down, he was pretty sure the idiot said, “More’s the pity.” But he couldn’t have. No one was so blasé about demons. Hezekiel checked his arm again. The skin around the blisters was swelling. Maybe Penelope would kiss it better.

~~~~

Hezekiel spotted Penelope leaving her dorm. She was in her running outfit. He better hurry to catch her before she started. She smiled when she saw him and that made his morning a little nicer. “You don’t need to run.”

Penelope laughed. Doll had never laughed at him, but this laughter was nice. She twitched her cute nose and her eyes danced. “You don’t know what I need.”

“A kiss?”

She laughed again and kissed him until he almost started to feel normal again. He needed to be with her, to feel her skin against his, but she wasn’t putting out yet. Doll had slept with him, both the sex part and the waking the next morning part, the evening they’d met. He’d known how a demon’s Mate should act. Penelope just laughed and asked what the hurry was, they had forever in front of them.

The hurry was the achy hunger that had grown inside Hezekiel every day since his split with Doll. Penelope was filling it, but slowly. Much too slowly since she wasn’t giving him enough skin to skin contact.

Had he done the right thing breaking up with Doll? But wouldn’t it be worse to fill and be filled by someone who couldn’t be his Mate. Not after what he’d felt the first time he saw Penelope, the first time he’d smelled her, tasted her.

No, he just needed her in his bed and everything would go back to the way it was.

“I’ll see you at lunch.” She ran her hand down his arm, which would have been fine, except that was the one with the blisters, so he flinched. He wasn’t used to feeling pain and this burn really hurt.

“Oh, poor baby.” She blew on his fingers. “What happened?”

An idiot had happened. “Nothing I can’t fix.”

She smiled. “A student spill their science project on you?”

If only it were that. Hezekiel smiled back. “See you at lunch.”

The blisters were bigger and the skin more puffy and swollen. He was going to have to get it looked at, but on campus. If he went to the med labs at home, he’d never hear the end of it. Demons gossiped worse than anyone.


	3. Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steele has a very bad day.

  
Steele walked into the weight room just as Lope was wiping down the shoulder press machine. “Starting or finishing?”

Lope made a face. “Starting. You never know who used these before you. Spot me?”

“Sure.” Steele took the cleaning supplies back to the station then went to count Lope’s reps.

She was not giving him the eager glances he’d become used to since the term started. They’d known each other on and off since they were tots. He still thought of her as almost a sister. After what she’d said at that party, she didn’t agree.

“Meet someone new?”

Her reps stopped and her eyes brightened. “I’ve got to tell you.”

“You’re at 47. Out of fifty?”

She finished her reps and let him take the chair. “He’s gorgeous. Not your kind…” Her eyes went dreamy. “It was love at first sight for him, being a demon and all. He spent all night seducing me.” She laughed. “Not that I put out or anything. But he wanted me to.”

She went on and on about her new guy and the more she said, the worse Steele felt.

Lope frowned. “You stopping at fifty-three?”

“Seventy-five. Your new guy. He wouldn’t happen to be Hezekiel?”

“Yeah.” She bit her lip. “He has an ex.”

That was an understatement. Steele finished his reps as Lope made lots of assumption about Dal.

“Seventy-four, seventy-five. Why are you so sure Dal should have expected it?”

“I mean.” She pushed up her glasses. “He had to know Hezekiel would leave him for his Mate.”

“Hezekiel told Dal, he was his Mate.” He tapped the new ring on Lope’s finger. “The ring he gave Dal had ‘P+G’ engraved in it. Hezekiel said it had belonged to his great grandparents.”

Lope yanked the ring off and paled. “P plus G. He said that his great grandmother had it made for his great grandfather because she wanted everyone to know who he belonged to.”

Steele nodded. “I’m sorry.”

She got up. “I just need… I need…”

“To run? Want company? I’d understand if you’d rather not have me.”

She pulled up her sweatshirt collar and wiped her eyes. “You? Why would I have a problem with you?”

“Dal is living with me.”

And she laughed and laughed until she had to clutch Steele to stand up. “The two of us.” She shook her head. “Let’s run.”

So they ran.

~~~~~

Steele slowed at the bottom of the hill. “I have to go.”

He and Lope had run ten miles and she didn’t seem ready to quit. She gasped for breath while jogging in place. “You go. I’ve got this.”

He hurried back to campus. He had a class that started in less than ten minutes. He could make it if he didn’t stop for a shower. He’d just have to sit in the back.

The class wasn’t too crowded, but the professor eyed him. After class, Steele walked down to Professor Onesimus. “Sorry about the smell.”

The professor laughed. “Not actually a bad smell. You do have several people on you.”

“Worked out in the weight room.”

Professor Onesimus wrinkled his nose. “Not my favorite place.”

Steele grinned his agreement. “On another topic, demon’s Mates.”

Professor Onesimus grinned. “Someone claimed you?”

“Not me.” How to word this? “How sure is a demon about who their Mate is? Could they get it wrong?”

The professor pursed his lips. “Not that I’ve ever heard of. We feel it in our bones. You take your first real breath. Your heart beats true for the first time. You are finally alive.”

“But could someone mistake that feeling?”

The professor put his fingers over his lips and stared at the ceiling. “Can a demon mistake something for Mating? What would the thing he mistake Mating for be?”

“Are you Mated?”

The professor grinned. “I take it this isn’t a proposition.”

Professor Onesimus was handsome and all, but Steele preferred lovers closer to his own age. “I’m in a relationship. Before you were Mated, were you ever worried that you might mistake the feeling for something else? Let the One get away? Tie yourself to the wrong person?”

“I am not Mated and, between you and me, I worry about that all the time. I know it is coming, and soon. I had my fates read—very expensive but possible for certain beings. I have been assured that I won’t tie myself, as you put it, to the wrong person. I will be compelled to seek them out once I finally meet them. And that person will want me too, protests to the contrary notwithstanding.”

Both Dal and Lope had been drawn to Hezekiel. Or at least thought they had.

“But could someone make a mistake?” How much to tell? Would a grown demon knowing put Dal in any danger? “A student, who had been claimed, was recently told it was all a mistake.”

The professor stood up straighter. “Tell me everything.”

Steele fought the urge to do just that.

Professor Onesimus shook his head. “Sorry. This is a tender spot for all demons. If someone is going around lying about our most sacred beliefs… I can’t even imagine.”

Steele swallowed hard. “I’m not sure he was lying. He might have been genuinely mistaken.”

“And that,” said the professor, “would be even worse.”

~~~~~~

Steele hurried back to the dorm. Dal had to be starving. Steele was starving. He juggled three dinners—two for him, one for Dal—his backpack, and the art supplies his professor insisted all the students get tonight so they could try them out before the next class.

And he still hadn’t taken that shower.

He itched.

And he was pretty sure he was being stalked. The footsteps had stopped when his did.

He didn’t have time for this.

He needed to order a pizza and cinnamon rolls. He’d need more food after a day like this.

He got everything organized then hurried to his dorm. The steps hurried too. When he was halfway up the steps, a voice yelled. “You!”

He sighed and carefully set the food down. This wasn’t worth losing his dinner over. He turned around. “What is it now?”

Hezekiel stalked up the stairs. Steele met him partway down. He wasn’t risking dinner.

“I don’t like you.”

Steele sighed. “The feeling is mutual.”

“Give me Dal.”

“He goes where he wants.”

“He wants me!”

“He wanted you, you idiot, but you broke up with him. Now he’s with me.”

Hezekiel got into Steele’s personal space and sniffed. “You’ve had sex with him! I thought that’s what I smelled this morning.”

“And?” Steele was too tired for this and it was only Monday.

“He’s mine!”

“He was yours and now he’s his own.” Why couldn’t this fleabag understand this? “He can go where he likes, talk to who he likes, eat what he likes. Even garlic. I don’t care what his spunk tastes like.”

The mongrel sneered. “He chooses to be with you?”

“He does.” And Steele should get back to him.

“You!”

Steele couldn’t deal with this on an empty stomach. He turned and climbed the stairs. A hand yanked him around.

“You smell like Penelope too!” Hezekiel looked practically in tears. His hand had to be burning, but he didn’t seem to notice. “You’re taking everything I love. You monster.”

Steele breathed out slowly. Why couldn’t today just be over? “Lope and I were in the weight room. I used machines after she did. She probably smells like other people’s sweat too.” Unless of course she’d had the shower Steele had missed. “Why don’t you talk to her?”

“She isn’t on campus.”

She couldn’t still be running. Steele had left her over four hours ago.

Hezekiel frowned. “And why did you call her Lope?”

Something witty and cruel, mysterious, or the simple truth? “Her brothers called her that because she didn’t walk when she could run and she had a funny gait at two. Her oldest brother was learning to read. He thought it was funny and got the rest of us to call her that too.”

“The rest of us?” Hezekiel crossed his arms and only then seemed to feel the new burn on his hand. His scowl deepened. “Who?”

Tonight was over. Just let the day end. “Her grandmother watched her and her brothers, her cousins, and me and my siblings while our parents were working.” Not all Wizarding families could afford to have a parent at home. “I met her when she was still crawling, but I don’t remember it.”

Hezekiel blew on his hand. “I hate you.”

Steel turned around and headed back up to his meal. The dinners had to be cold by now. Eat them and shower while he waited for the pizza to be delivered? Cookies. He needed cookies. And Milk. Maybe he could bribe a freshman to make a store run for him. How much did he have to last him until Saturday?

A bolt of power hit him square in the back. Good thing he hadn’t put his backpack on; it would have been toast. His body wanted to let go of all he held, but he hadn’t got all the way to his front steps just to drop the dinner he needed so badly. He took a shaky step toward the door. “Nice try, Mutt.”

“What?” said the cur. “Are you questioning my parentage?”

Steele turned at the door and looked back. “I have to with the way you’re acting.”

Then he went inside and closed the door.

~~~~~~~

The door to his dorm room opened before he could get to it. Dal took the art supplies from Steele’s arms. “I saw everything. You’re so brave.”

Dal led him to the chair, opened the top dinner box on the pile and handed Steele a fork. “Gabe is bringing over a pizza and someone named Ash has peanut butter chocolate chip cookies.”

Despite being cold, the food smelled good. “This box was supposed to be yours.”

Dal slid onto his lap. “Thank you.”

He took a bite and fed the next bite to Steele. “Now eat.”

Steele ate. He felt better after a box and a half. “I ran ten miles today.”

“I didn’t leave the dorm. Everyone I met is nice here, even if they’re a little shy. I’ll go to class tomorrow, but I’m to have escorts.” Dal grinned. “Ash, whoever that is. Their boyfriend doesn’t have any classes this term, so he’ll take me about in the morning, and Bene, Gabe’s boyfriend, will take me about after noon, then I’ll be yours all evening.”

His kiss was so very nice. But Steele smelled awful. He slid Dal from his lap and stood up. “I need a shower.”

Dal licked his lips. “I’ll be waiting for you.”

When Steele came out, clean at last, it was to Dal shirtless, a giant pizza with all his favorite topping, and three different kinds of cookies. “They didn’t stay.”

“Gabe and Bene brought Ash and Akakios over so I could meet them, but they said food would do most of the work and they’re leaving the rest to me. They even brought you ginger beer. Ash says you like it with your pizza.”

Steele wrapped his arms around Dal. He really had the best friends in the world.


	4. Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The foundations of Hezekiel's world collapse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Both Hezekiel's parents use the singular they as their pronoun of choice.

  
Hezekiel trudged up to Penelope’s dorm room, straightened his shoulders, and knocked politely. Her roommate answered, but instead of calling Penelope like she normally did, she just smacked her gum and stared at him.

When he tried to look past her, she rolled her eyes. “Pen doesn’t want to talk to you.”

That wasn’t right at all. “She does.”

“The least you can do is acknowledge that you hurt her.”

“I didn’t do anything.”

“Pen ran a marathon today, missing all her afternoon classes and dinner, then she fell into bed without even a shower. Not like her at all. Whatever you did must have been a doozy.”

Hezekiel took in a deep breath. Penelope’s sweat, but none of the idiot’s, so perhaps he hadn’t been lying. Hezekiel wanted to go in and check for himself, but if her guard dog called campus security on him, he’d been even worse off than he was now.

“I’ll talk to her in the morning.”

“You do that.” The girl shut the door. People had no respect for demons anymore.

Hezekiel wandered the campus and found himself outside the idiot’s dorm again. Which room was his? And were the sounds of sex coming from it?

He reigned in his temper. The very idea of anyone else touching Doll hurt more than the burns on his hand and arm. They just throbbed. Steele with his hands on Doll, Doll wanted it, hurt to his very soul.

Maybe he’d been wrong. Maybe Doll had been his true Mate all along. But then why did he felt the soul crushing need for Penelope?

~~~~

Hezekiel sighed as he arrived at his parents’ door for their weekly family dinner. Last Thursday, he’s brought Penelope over for the first time and now she wasn’t talking to him. But staring at the door wasn’t making any of his problems go away. Time to demon up.

“Salathiel, Cunobelinus, I’m home.”

Cunobelinus looked up from the paperwork scattered table. “Alone?”

Hezekiel nodded.

Salathiel came in from the kitchen. “That’s for the best. We have questions.”

“Questions?”

“Like why did you smell like a young male familiar for so long, then introduce a young female wizard as your Mate?” He looked back into the kitchen. “Don’t answer yet.”

He hurried into the kitchen.

Cunobelinus stacked up the papers without looking up. “Set the table.”

Hezekiel did. Normally his parents would joke with and tease each other. The most he got tonight, when Cunobelinus went in to help Salathiel, was a whispered, “I didn’t raise him to be like this.”

An eon later when food was set before Hezekiel, he wasn’t hungry. Salathiel glared at Cunobelinus then put on a placid face. “Eat your dinner.”

“Salathiel didn’t slave over the fire for you to just stare at it.”

Hezekiel looked back and forth between his parents. “But don’t you like to cook?”

Salathiel laughed. Cunobelinus shook their head. “They hate cooking.”

“But you can only cook the fancy stuff and desserts.”

“And a growing demon can’t live on foie gras and chocolate mousse alone.”

“So I cook when you’re home.”

Hezekiel’s world had shattered. “What do you do when I’m at school?”

“Eat out.”

“Live on foie gras and chocolate mousse.”

“Drink each other’s blood in a pinch.”

His parents said that like it was the most normally thing in the demon realm.

Cunobelinus grinned. “You only do that when you’re mad at me.”

“But Salathiel never gets mad at you.”

Cunobelinus laughed loud and long. Salathiel scowled. “That’s why I think we shouldn’t have hid our relationship problems from him.”

“You agreed at the time.”

“At the time, I wasn’t sure how long we were going to stay together. I didn’t want to break his little heart until I’d packed.”

“You packed every month.”

“I kept a bag packed.” Salathiel took a bite as if he wasn’t throwing rocks into the rubble of Hezekiel’s world.

“You.” Hezekiel struggled for breath. “But you’re Mates.”

“That’s what I said.” Cunobelinus pointed his fork at Hezekiel before taking another bite.

“But…”

“Just because we’re Mates, doesn’t mean we both don’t have hot tempers and strong personalities.” Salathiel looked him over. “But I’m sure you know that, seeing that you’re alone tonight.”

Hezekiel looked at his plate. “Penelope isn’t talking to me.”

“What did you do?”

He looked up at his parents. They had to love him, right? No matter what he’d done. Right?

“I made a mistake about who my Mate was.”

His parents looked at each other. Salathiel spoke first. “Your son seems to have a problem.”

“He’s my son now, is he? I seemed to recall he was your son when he graduated with honors.”

Salathiel preened. “It was the angel blood showing through.”

“Angel?” Where had that come from?

Salathiel closed his second set of eyelids. “Cunobelinus, this is your fault.” He turned to Hezekiel. “As you may have noticed, our names end with iel, which is how most names end where I’m from in the demon realm.”

“They call themselves angels.” Cunobelinus rolled his eyes.

Salathiel ignored him. “Our wings are feathered.”

Hezekiel thought back to the last time he’d brought out his wings. He didn’t do it often, because the kids used to tease him, and really if magic could float you, why go through the effort of flying? His chest would hurt for days afterward.

“Mine are… feathered?”

Salathiel rolled his eyes. Cunobelinus laughed and pointed at Salathiel. Salathiel crossed their arms. “Better fluff up your pillow. You’re on the couch tonight.”

“Cunobelinus can’t sleep on the couch.”

Cunobelinus leaned back in his chair. “Done it hundreds of times.”

“That’s because you refuse to sleep in the guest room.”

“But if I slept in the guest room, you’d have moved me in there. Hezekiel, remember when you were about ten and we stopped letting you leave your room at night?”

“That’s because I was old enough to sleep alone.”

Salathiel snorted. “It’s because Cunobelinus didn’t want you to see him sleeping on the couch. Remember the month you spent with Cunobelinus’s parents?”

That had been his funnest summer ever.

Cunobelinus sighed. “It could have been longer than a month, but Salathiel finally agreed to move back home.”

Hezekiel shot to his feet. “You moved out!”

“I went to visit,” he used air quotes, “my parents.”

“I wasn’t sure I was ever getting Salathiel back.” Cunobelinus put his hand on theirs. “But they finally forgave me enough to finish raising you.”

“What did you do?”

“Something stupid.”

Salathiel shook his head. “You are your parent’s son.” They took a deep breath. “Now what are we going to do about you?”

Hezekiel slumped back in his chair. “Nothing can be done.”

“Start at the beginning.”

Hezekiel took a deep breath. “Two years ago, I stopped in to see a friend teach, because my first TA class was starting the next term. I smelled something so good that I couldn’t concentrate.”

He went on about meeting Doll and quickly seducing him. He’d wanted to bring Doll to meet his parents, but everything was so new. “And by the time I’d decided to do it, you started dropping hints about how immature I was and how I couldn’t handle a Mate, so I kept him away.”

“Your son is an idiot.”

“My son?” Cunobelinus shook their head. “I was trying to get you to prove me wrong.”

“Instead he proved you right.”

Cunobelinus put his hand over Salathiel’s. “Perhaps we should cut our losses on this one and start over.”

Salathiel pulled his hand away. “You’re not saddling me with another eighteen years of dinners and placid faces when I want to strangle you. If you find a way to get pregnant again, this kid is going to know you sleep on the couch.”

Hezekiel sat up. “Cunobelinus carried me?”

“Of course they did. Imagine me giving up my flat stomach.” Salathiel shook their head. “Even for a few months. What do you take me for?”

Now that Hezekiel really thought, he couldn’t imagine it. “But you fed me. Everyone called you my carrying parent.”

“Cunobelinus is a terrible parent of a baby. They tried to feed you foie gras and my first day back to work, they ignored you the whole time I was gone: no food, no diaper changes, no cuddles. The spell they were working on took all their attention. You probably screamed the day through. If I wanted you to survive infanthood, I was going have to do everything myself. Which is why we aren’t having any more.”

“Salathiel darling, I was so young. I’m more mature now.”

Salathiel turned to Hezekiel. “I raised an infant and a baby-adult. Two children were always going to be enough for me.”

“Salathiel dearest, had I known—”

Salathiel raised a hand. “One more word about this tonight and I’ll be the one finding another bed.”

Cunobelinus clicked their teeth together. Salathiel watched them for a moment, then turned back to Hezekiel. “You haven’t got to Penelope.”

Hezekiel explained living with Doll, including some but not all of the things he regretted. Salathiel was wearing that placid face again. It no longer brought Hezekiel comfort.

Then he got to Penelope. “I saw her run by and I knew. I knew I had to be with her. She was the one for me. I followed her scent and flirted with her outside her dorm. Then I went home. To Doll. He smelled as good as he always did, but I wasn’t getting the thrill I’d gotten with Penelope, so I told him it was over. I’d been mistaken.”

Salathiel opened their mouth, shut it, then stood up and strode from the room.

Cunobelinus watched them go. They finally pulled their gaze back to Hezekiel and took his hand. “Had you gotten a thrill when you first met Doll?”

Hezekiel nodded. “And in the weeks since we’ve been apart, I’ve gotten hungrier and hungrier. Nothing feeds me like he did. Like his smile, the touch of his hand, his body beside mine.”

“My poor boy. My precious little child.” He pulled Hezekiel into his lap, making himself bigger until Hezekiel fit. “My son has made rather a bungle of things.”

“And Penelope won’t do more than kiss me. Wouldn’t do more than kiss me. Now she’s talked to Doll’s new lover and she won’t speak to me at all.”

“New lover?” Salathiel’s voice sounded odd. When had they come back?

“He’s imperious to my magic and he wears a charm that does this.” Hezekiel showed off his hand. Cunobelinus gently touched the places between the blisters. Four days of ointment had made them look a little better, but they still hurt like his broken soul.

“Hezekiel, you will stay here until that’s healed. By then we’ll know what to do.”

Salathiel left again.

Hezekiel’s eyes filled with tears. “He’s mad at me.”

Cunobelinus patted Hezekiel’s hair. “I’m mad at you. He’s mad at me. Let’s give him a while to cool down, then I can teach you to grovel.”

“Demons don’t grovel.”

“They do if they don’t want to sleep alone.”


	5. Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steele takes a leap and discovers that Wizarding pharmaceuticals have come a long way. And gets Dall that piece of paper that he really wants.

  
Steele had enjoyed the weekend without the fleabag of a demon around. More to the point Dal had enjoyed it. They’d gone out Friday night with friends and spent all Saturday hiking around the mountains with Steele’s friends and several of Dal’s classmates who had considered him a friend back before Hezekiel.

On Sunday he’d called his folks and everyone, including Lope’s grandmother had wanted to talk to Dal then tell Steele how much they wanted to meet him in person. A trip home would cost more than he was comfortable with, but his brother mentioned that they were all going to pitch in a few bucks and see how far that went.

Lope had come over and despite Steele’s misgivings, she got on quite well with Dal. But Steele was glad when she went home. He flopped onto the bed and stared at the ceiling. Dal straddled him. He put his hands on those perfect hips.

Dal leaned down and kissed him. “She has a crush on you.”

“Babe, I grew up with her. Can’t understand it.”

Dal laughed. “I can. Big, strong man, oh so nice, great hair.”

“Beer belly.” Steele slapped his.

“I’ll never have to worry about weighing more than you even if I carry your triplets. You were one of three, right?”

Steele licked his lips. “My babies?”

“Yours.” Dal came down for another kiss. “I’d like to start now. We can get married over the summer or something.”

“Married.” Steele couldn’t be hearing things right. He was just an average, if a bit heavy, guy and Dal was beautiful. Plus they hadn’t been dating a week. “Are you sure?”

Dal laughed. “Since the day I moved in with you, you keep asking me to say what I want. You always seem to always know when I want something.”

“But I don’t always know what you want. I’m not a mind reader.”

Dal kissed him. “So I’m saying what I want. Steele, will you marry me? May we have children together?”

Steele reached up and touched his lips. “I would be honored to have children with you.”

“Marry me.”

Steele had so many question, but he knew his answer, no matter how much trouble it would get him into. “Yes.”

Dal leaned over to the bedside table, rubbing himself against Steele in all the right places. He came back with Steele’s phone. After a fun minute of giggles and rubs, he settled himself astride Steele again and swiped the screen. “Will you, or shall I?”

What was he about? “You.”

“Thank you.” Dal tapped the screen then held it to his ear. “May I speak with Steele’s mother?”

Steele raised his eyebrows. Dal just grinned. “Mom, this is Dal.”

Mom sounded very happy to be called.

When Dal could get a word in, he said, “I just asked Steele to marry me.”

Mom shouted that to Dad, who said something Steele didn’t catch.

“As I’m sure you’ve guessed, he said yes.”

It was probably a good thing Steele and Dal had told how they met, then skipped to when Dal moved in.

“So I was thinking, is there anything I should know before I get pregnant? Anything that runs in the family or whatever?”

Dal raised his eyebrows. “You are? No, I haven’t seen him shift.”

He laughed. They talked for ages. Dal moved his hips every now and then, which kept Steele from trying to get up.

Dal’s face stilled and he moved the phone away from his face. “Mom wants to hold the wedding at her place.”

Mom would. She and Dad had worked all their lives to afford the nice house with pleasant grounds. “If the day is nice, we can get married under the trees.”

Dal licked his lips. “What about under the blossoms?”

Steele sat up as much as he could. “She’s not pressuring you or anything?” He took the phone. “Mom, we’ll call you back.”

Dal stared at Steele’s shirt. “She… since I want to start a family right away, she doesn’t see the point in waiting to get married.”

“And what do you think?”

Dal swallowed hard. “I’m happy you want to be with me enough to start a family, to marry me. I never hoped our forever would start so soon.”

Steele pulled Dal down and rolled them over. “I’m yours already.”

Dal closed his eyes. “But I want a stupid piece of paper and family around to see you say I’ll be yours forever.”

A tear slid down his cheek.

Steele kissed his wet eyes. His poor darling hurt Dal. “Then let’s have a party with family and a precious piece of paper. We can frame it and put it over our bed.”

Dal squeezed him. “I love you.”

“Have my babies.”

Dal laughed. “Now? Or after we call your Mom back?”

Mom could wait. If Steele waited, he’d talk himself out of starting a family with a demon’s ex Mate and then he’d hate himself for it. “What do we need?”

Dal rolled over to the bedside table and opened the drawer. “One bottle lube with catnip extracts. You’ll need to come inside me once for every baby we want. It doesn’t all have to be tonight. We have three days.”

“So don’t throw out the condoms?” Keeping it to two or three times would be the hard part.

“Nope, the condoms are gone.” Dal scooped them up and chucked them into the trash. “We can go back to the other lube when we’ve made enough kittens.”

“And it will work for me?” Steele wasn’t a cat.

“I have been assured,” Dal put his hand over his heart, “that it will work with anyone spilling seed within a familiar.”

Steele pulled Dal close. If this didn’t work, he was game for trying something else. Many other something elses.

~~~~~

Steele set his tray beside Dal’s. Lope was chatting away. “That first night was hard, but it’s gotten easier.”

She stole one of Dal’s fries. Steele swatted her hand away. She laughed. “He doesn’t care.”

Dal pushed the fries onto her tray. “I thought I wanted them, but I don’t.”

Dal had been nauseated all week. He insisted that meant the babies had taken, while Steele was more worried Dal had the flu. Did people get morning sick after only one week? And would a flu affect the babies if they existed?

But people had been having babies for millennia. Steele was being overprotective to a silly degree.

Dal nestled against his side. Lope laughed. “He’s so small, he hardly needs to eat anything.”

Dal could put a lot away after an all-nighter, be it homework or sex, though since he tended to do his homework and studying when Steel was in class or exercising, it had mostly been sex.

Dal stuck out his tongue. Lope laughed more. Steele sighed. They were getting along pretty much like he and Lope had before college. And at least she’d stopped making doe eyes at Steele.

“I was going to come home two weekends from now, but Mom says to come home this weekend, because she and Dad are going to visit your parents. I haven’t seen your family in forever.”

Steele’s heart beat in his ears. He hadn’t even told his friends about his coming marriage after their lack of joy when he’d mentioned being engaged. They were still concerned about what Hezekiel’s inability to recognize his Mate meant for their own relationships. They just couldn’t understand how he could have been wrong. Steele hoped the piece of paper and the coming kittens would put an end to speculations that Hezekiel might have been right the first time and wrong the second.

He pulled himself back to the conversation. “Your grandmother lives on my parent’s property.”

She swished her hair. “I didn’t say my parents hadn’t seen them. Track kept me busy every weekend and she used to watch me run.”

Steele buried his nose in Dal’s hair. “Babe, do you want any of my soup?”

Lope laughed about Steele giving up any of his food. Just for that, Steele encouraged Dal to eat the whole thing. He had more color after, so that was good.

“Are you guys going home this weekend?”

Steele looked up. “Yeah. Dal is going to meet the family.”

“And Dal, what about your family?”

Dal stiffened. “My family is too far away to visit.”

His fathers were part of a demon’s collection. They had pretty good lives if you forgot the part that they couldn’t leave. No wonder Dal had put up with Hezekiel’s prison without complaint. It was really the only life he’d known until his fathers got him smuggled out when he was twelve.

Not all demons were the good guys, just like not all wizards or familiars were.

Lope, never one to keep her foot out of her mouth, said. “Are you done growing? You’re so small? Are your parents that small?”

“I’m twenty-one, so this is probably it for me.” Dal sighed. “My fathers were from breeds of tiny cats. But I don’t remember how tall they are.”

“Lope,” time to change the subject. “Are you running this afternoon?”

Lope brightened. “You coming?”

“No.” Dal needed some attention. “But I’ll meet you in the weight room.”

“All right!” She stood up and lifted her tray. “See you then. Bye, Dal.”

Steele got Dal back to their room before Dal’s tears started pouring. He sniffed. “If you had babies with her, they’d be big and tall.”

“I don’t want babies with her.” Steele got down on his knees in front of Dal. “Even if our babies are little tubs who never reach your shoulder, I will love them always because they are ours. Even if they are lean and pretty and taller than me.”

“I hope not the girls.” Dal laughed through his tears. “They’d never find husbands if they are as picky as Pen.”

Steele kissed his hands. “Maybe they’d find wives, or stay single. I’d love them the same. I love you.”

Dal cried harder and buried his face against Steele’s neck.

Steele held him. “What can I do for you? What is it you want?”

Dal sniffed. “I want to know whether these are babies or just my imagination. I want this weekend to come faster. I want to be your bride.”

Steele kissed his head. “I was thinking…”

“Yeah.” Dal sniffed again.

“You don’t have any exams Friday or Tuesday, right?”

“And essay and two lectures.”

“If I can get someone to take notes for us and if we can get our homework done, why don’t we head home Thursday night? The wedding won’t be until Saturday still, but Lope’s grandma can tell us if you’re carrying and how many. She hasn’t been wrong yet.”

“Steele, I love you.”

“I love you, Baby.”

“You can call me Dal again.”

Steele had stopped that first day when he figured out what caused Dal to flinch.

“You don’t actually sound anything like Hez.”

“And you don’t want me calling you Baby?”

Dal nodded. “Now that the babies are coming. Might be coming.”

“Oh they are coming.” Steele lifted Dal’s shirt and kissed his belly. “If they aren’t at home yet, they will be next month or the month after.”

Dal relaxed in his arms. “Have time to take me to bed before your next class?”

Steele checked his phone. “Long enough to remind you I love you. As long as you keep your hands to yourself.” Dal had a way of making everything more intense. “If I miss this class, we won’t be able to leave until Friday afternoon.”

Dal put his hands behind his back. “I’ll be good.”

And he’d make Steele ache for him all the minutes they were apart. But that was part of loving Dal. Poor Hezekiel. He’d never have that again.

“Dalimil.”

Steele looked up from kissing Dal’s belly. “Huh?”

“My name.”

Steele moved up to lie beside Dal. “I was born Baako as are all firstborns in my family. I was renamed Steele at four because I’m so stubborn.”

Dal grinned. “I like you stubborn. What will our other children be named?”

“Baako just means first child. We could call them for what first, second, and third are in the language of you fathers.”

Dal gasped. “They’ll never know my babies.”

“We’ll find a way to save them.”

Then Dal took over the seduction. Steele was a little late for class, but Ash had saved him a seat and taken notes, so that wouldn’t put off their plans for the weekend.

~~~~~~

Steele led Dal to the rocking chair where Lope’s grandmother sat. His mother was trying to get them to rest and relax after their journey, but Steele had arranged for a quick, but expensive, trip via wizard’s step, so they were fine and Dal couldn’t really relax until he knew.

Grandma Aella held out her hands and gestured for Dal to take them. “My, you aren’t as young as you look, but still quite the child. May I?”

She put her hands on Dal’s belly. “Oh.”

“Please.” Dal was going to cry again. Steele passed over a tissue.

“One.” Grandma Aella grinned at Dal. “Two. And is that a third?”

Dal was shaking now. Steele wrapped his arms around him. “Three.”

Grandma Aella laughed. “Two I’ll bet on, but I feel like there’s another.” She patted Dal’s hand. “We’ll know more when they get bigger. You’ve just barely started.”

Steele led Dal to the sofa and plied him with lemonade and crackers.

“Two at least.”

“If all goes right.”

Dal laughed. “If all goes right I’ll make a commercial for that lube.”

Steele’s family barged in and introduced themselves. His littlest sibling had grown a lot since the summer. Mom brought out photo albums and showed off all Steele’s baby pictures.

“You were so cute. All those spikes.”

“Don’t let the quills scare you,” Mom patted Dal’s hands.

“Too late if it does,” said Steele’s littlest sister. “Grandma Aella says we’ll have new babies before the New Year.”

Mom cried and hugged Dal. You’d think the babies were hers. Steele got his share of thumps on the back and he was forced to start a wrestling match just to wear off some of his siblings’ energy. The adults were manic too, explaining the plans for the wedding and asking if they were all right, as if they had time to change anything.

Long after the sun set, Steele cuddled with Dal in the spare room. He’d never lived in this house except for summers.

Morning came too soon and whizzed by. Steele was dragged away to try on the rented suit and run errands for Mom. The cake was enormous. How many people did she think were going to be there? But if all the family friends who were chipping in renting suits or chairs, or tables, loaning napkins, table clothes, and china, sewing dresses, arranging flowers, and baking cakes came, it might all get eaten.

Steele didn’t see Dal again until dinner time. Dal bounced around and looked so happy Steele wanted to cry. He held him tight. “I want you this happy all the time.”

Dal smirked up at him. “That’s what makes me happy.”

Dal begged off games after dinner. He was tired and insisted Steele was too. In the quiet of their room, Dal made his happiness felt.

Steele kissed his hand. “For my own heart, I need to ask. Do you have any regrets? That it’s me, not him.”

Dal caressed Steele’s cheek. “A year ago I would have given anything to be his acknowledged lover, but now that I know what real love is… I’m glad I didn’t settle.”

A chubby average looking guy who just happened to be in the right place at the right time wasn’t settling? “You’re amazing.”

“I know.” Dal laughed. “And you’re wonderful.”

“I’ll take your word for that.”

“You better. And if you move your hand right here.” He moved Steele’s hand. “I’m sure you can think of several things that you know you’re excellent at.”

Steele could. “How many things?”

“Seven.”

“Seven?” They had to sleep at some point.

“We might need to finish up in the morning.”

They didn’t have to, but did anyway. Dal said they probably wouldn’t have time for sex tonight.

Breakfast was barely served when the dishes were whisked away. Mom never sat down. Grandma Aella entertained the little ones, whose numbers grew as the day went on.

After lunch Steele was stuffed into his suit. Lope arrived with her family. She was wearing shorts and a t-shirt. “Everyone’s dressed up but me.”

Her mom held out a garment bag. “I told you to dress up.”

“We don’t need to dress up to see Steele’s family,” she turned back to Steele. “Or so I said. They think you’re getting married.”

Steele pulled on his lapels. “I am. In about an hour. If you want to put the dress on, Dal’s upstairs. Otherwise, I’m sure there’s some errand you can run.”

“Steele,” called one of the faceless throng. “Can I have a hand here?”

“I’ll do it,” said Lope.

One lost child and a spilled drink later, Lope came down. “Your mom wants pictures under the cherry trees.”

“Now?” They’d just set tables up.

“Now. Before the party ruins the grass. There won’t be time after the ceremony.”

So Steele and a few cousins moved the tables three times until Mom was finally satisfied. He was sent around the house to get a trunk from an uncle’s car. Why had they dressed him up if he was just doing manual labor? Shouldn’t the suit be kept for the ceremony? As he slipped back into the yard, Mom pulled him close and straightened his tie, jacket and hair. “Picture time.”

Uncle Cordell laughed. “You can see him.”

Dal grinned. “How could you tell?”

“Your eyes brightened. A few more of you looking at him, then we’ll get him in with you.”

Dal was beautiful. He had opted for deep midnight, which brought out the blue of his eyes and the black of his hair and didn’t drain color from his pale skin. Although he’d been given at least a dozen options, this was definitely a dress. It had probably been worn by a bridesmaid in the past, but with Dal’s short statue and slight frame, it was long enough for a train and the waist was high, giving a generous hint to what he carried in his still flat belly.

Uncle Cordell directed as he and his oldest daughter and her son took pictures. At first the audience was annoying, but Dal had a way of drawing all his attention. Too soon other people posed with them. Mom and Dad. His siblings. His sister and her family. Cousins. Aunts and Uncles. Lope’s family. Just Lope. Grandma Aella. Friends. Guests. Babies he’s never met. Children he remembered as babies. Babies of people he’d built forts with and raced bikes with.

Mom finally called an end to it. Dal took Steele’s hand. “The next wedding we’ll have babies to pass around.”

Steele pulled Dal into his arms. Mom pushed then a little to the side then let them be. When Steele came up for air, people were settling in the chairs. Uncle Cordell was still taking pictures, and Uncle Dawson, Mom’s favorite cousin’s great uncle, had stepped into place to officiate.

“Everyone ready?” Uncle Dawson looked around. “One more moment for the stragglers. You might as well kiss him again.”

Dal laughed and pulled Steele down to his level. Steel wrapped his arms around Dal and lifted him up. The crowd laughed. Uncle Dawson cleared his throat. “Whenever you’re ready.”

Steele set Dal down and let Dal straighten his tie, jacket, and hair. Dal was still perfect. He fluffed his skirt a bit, took Steele’s hand and turned to Uncle Dawson. He fluttered his long eyelashes at Uncle Dawson.

“I can see why you picked this one, Steele.”

“Sir, he picked me.”

The crowd laughed again. A baby whined. Cameras clicked.

Life happened.

Steele couldn’t have repeated afterward anything that was said. He’d told everyone who mattered that he loved Dal and wanted to spend his life together. Dal said something about loving the family as much as the man. At some point Mom sobbed. People laughed at the jokes. Steele even laughed once, at something Dal said. Then Uncle Dawson told them to kiss again, so they had.

People came up and patted Steele’s back and Dal had been dragged away for something that couldn’t wait. Steele was a married man now. He didn’t feel any different. His dad and uncles laughed, saying that would come later.

Dal was handed back to him in a loose tunic and wide pants made from some soft flowing fabric and the Steele was the one dragged away to be changed. He was dressed like his bride, but in red instead of blue, and led back into the crowd. Dal found him in time for more pictures. This time with the enormous cake, which looked even bigger in Mom’s kitchen.

Mom saved the top layer for Steele and Dal to share with their friends at college. He’d have to tell them they were married first.

The day lasted forever and no time at all. They were sent off in a shower of blossoms to Grandma Aella’s cottage, which she was loaning them for their very short honeymoon.

The upstairs bedroom was decorated with silk hangings and the windows let in the scent of flowers. Steele lay on the bed and looked at the ceiling. Dal had first dibs at the bathroom. “We should do up our dorm room just like this.”

Dal lay beside him. “Umm?”

“That way our honeymoon never has to end.”

Dal reminded him physically what married life was like, the importance of a piece of paper and family to one forced to live on trust, and just how much love one person could give.

As their hearts and breaths quieted, Steele tucked Dal against his side. “Dalimil Ohansian.”

“And the babies Ohansian.”

“One, Two, and possibly Three.”

“Jeden, Dva, and possibly Tri.”

“Ohansian.”

Dal laughed.

He was going to say he loved Steele, but this time Steele was going to say it first. “Dal Ohansian, I love you.”

Dal kissed his cheek. “Husband, go to sleep. I’m not awake enough to respond to that properly.”

“Our first morning as a married couple.”

Dal settled against him. “You’re going to get up, make me some of that tea your mom got me to quiet the morning queasiness, then you’ll come back to bed and we aren’t getting up again until they bring us breakfast.”

“Yes, dear.”

“Yes, husband yours.”

“Yes, husband mine.” Steele shut his eyes. He still couldn’t believe the day had actually happened. “You really are a dream come true.”

“I’ll show you a dream. When I’m not quite so tired.”

Steele was going to hold him to that. 


	6. Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hezekiel puts in the effort and gets the perfect day, but that doesn't last.

  
Hezekiel had agonized over his letter to Penelope. He’d poured his heart out to her, showed her how lost he was without her and begged to be allowed to kiss even the hem of her skirt. Cunobelinus said he just had to keep up the groveling until he believed himself dirt, then she’d give in. Hezekiel wasn’t ready for that yet, but it seemed to work for Cunobelinus. They were back in the marriage bed by the second night, although the next week they almost got the boot again.

Hezekiel had asked again about what Cunobelinus had done, when they were in a better mood. They said they’d over-promised and Salathiel had never been able to forgive them for not being that dream demon.

When Hezekiel had repeated that to Salathiel, they’d laughed and dragged Cunobelinus into the bedroom for three days. Hezekiel had been forced to fend for himself. He missed Dal’s cooking.

But the letter was written and hand delivered and he’d gotten the response charm when she’d opened it, but then he’d had to wait over a week for her to respond. Now he was finally going to met her.

She wore her hair in a ponytail, cut off jeans and a tank top. She ran hot, she said, and didn’t mind the spring chill. She’d run today, but had since showered. She smiled at him. “Hez, how’ve you been?”

Dal was the one who called him Hez. “Fine. Now that I’ve seen you.”

“How sweet. Take me to lunch.”

Hezekiel close a quiet cafe a distance from campus. Penelope picked the most boring thing on the menu. At another time soup and toasted cheese might have been heaven, but it was the only think he knew how to cook and he’d been living on it for more than a month. Salathiel would only cook one night a week. At least Hezekiel had had rich puddings and decadent cakes to eat for dessert. Cunobelinus hadn’t abandoned him.

Hezekiel picked the Reuben. Lots of different flavors in it.

“So, Hez, what have you been up to?”

He grinned. “Did you miss me?”

She held her fingers a little apart. “A bit.”

He put his hand over his heart and faked a swoon. “Now that’s just cold.”

Penelope laughed. “I’ve missed you lots.”

“I’ve missed you too.” Cunobelinus said to show vulnerability, but demons weren't vulnerable. Still Penelope sighed, so maybe they were right.

“I think we should start going out again.”

Yes!

She pulled something from her pocket. The ring he’d given her. She held it out. He shrank from it. When the ring came back, he’d have no hope left.

“Give this to me again when you know you mean it.”

He let her drop it into his hand. “But I mean it now.”

“Yeah,” she nodded, “but you were wrong before. I don’t want to see this ring again until we’re ready to get married.”

“Marry me now?”

She laughed and closed his fingers over the ring. “Don’t lose it. I’m going to want it back, but we should go on real dates first. Get to know each other.”

But they did know each other.

“And,” she pushed up her glasses. “I was at a wedding a few weeks back and got to talking with some married ladies. They all agreed that waiting for the wedding night for sex is asking to be disappointed. We’ll be tired and danced out and on your wedding night you can’t stop and try it some other time when it’ll work better for you.”

Those words obviously meant something to Penelope, but Hezekiel just couldn’t grasp them.

“And since I want to be able to back off and try again later with you, if we need to, which we might because I’ve never even gone out with anyone but you, so we should date with the idea that at some point we’ll start having sex.”

Sex. Sex Hezekiel could understand. “Whatever you feel is best.”

That was also a line from Cunobelinus.

Penelope grinned. “I’m glad you agree. So this Friday, you’ll take me out and we’ll come back to my place afterward. My roommate’s gone this weekend. And if sex happens it happens and if it doesn’t you can still spend the night.”

“I would be pleased to cuddle with you.” Skin to skin was almost as good as sex. He could work with this.

Penelope grinned and kissed him. After lunch they made out in the park. When he finally had to let her go he headed to the library. He had never had sex with a virgin or even anyone who had been a virgin recently. Someone had to know the best way to make sure he got to spend the night afterward.

~~~~~~

Hezekiel whistled as he bounced down the steps of Penelope’s dorm. Their date had been great, and the making out afterward fantastic, when the sex part came, she’d gotten shy. He’d then pulled a book and supplies from his bag and they’d read together, trying things as they came to them.

She liked the less vanilla parts best and ended up Cowgirling him. Very good but not what he expected of dear, sweet Penelope. Maybe that’s why they needed to get to know each other better. What would have happened if he’d just done what he thought she wanted and she put up with it because she thought that was what he wanted? The might be married for decades and still as unhappy as Hezekiel’s parents.

Maybe he should buy them a book of positions for their anniversary.

Hezekiel laughed. Today was wonderful.

Back at his apartment, there was a summons on the door. He pulled it off and a response charm floated away. This wasn’t some weird invitation from his parents. It had his full name on it. He didn’t even remember all of that without humming the tune Salathiel had taught him. He hummed it twice just to make sure the summons had it correct.

Yep, for him.

This must have something to do with the university. It was being held in the coliseum and officiated by Professor Onesimus. Whatever. He wrote the day and time on his calendar—looked like he was to be a witness—and tossed the summons aside.

Would this be one of those that took him wherever he happened to be and dropped him off where they wanted him? Better not find out. He’d heard stories of demons plucked from showers or orgies or even gardening and dropped in front of the court.

He went back and gave his calendar a note to remember the date a few days ahead, then flopped onto his bed. He hadn’t actually hadn’t gotten much sleep last night, but he felt better than he had in months.

~~~~~~

Hezekiel woke to pounding on his door. He struggle out of bed. Time to get up anyway and find some dinner.

His parents were at the door. They never came to visit. He rubbed his face. “What brings you here?”

Salathiel held up a summons. They’d been crying. “We need to talk.”

Hezekiel let them in. He rubbed his face again. “What’s this about?”

His parents were breaking up and they were doing him the courtesy of ruining his perfect day now, rather than tomorrow or at the next family dinner.

Cunobelinus held up a second summons. “We were going to ask. Our say our names and list us as your parents.”

“I got one, but it doesn’t say anything.” He handed it over. His parents scoured it and turned it over. The other side just had his simple name and address. “If you don’t know any more than I do, what’s got you so upset?”

He sat on the arm of his couch. He was ready for this, whatever it was.

“Cunobelinus and I,” Salathiel patted Cunobelinus’s hand. “We’ve been worried about you. We used the summons as an excuse to… to.”

“To spy on you.” Cunobelinus grinned.

“I wanted to know more about the boy you thought was your Mate.” Salathiel swallowed hard. “He wasn’t hard to find. We could still smell you on him. Faintly.”

Good.

Salathiel rested his face against Cunobelinus’s shoulder. Cunobelinus patted his hand and looked at Hezekiel. “He’s pregnant and Salathiel just couldn’t wait to talk to him. They was so sure they were about to become a grandparent.”

Hezekiel would have interrupted if he’d had a voice. Doll was pregnant.

Salathiel sobbed against Cunobelinus’s shoulder.

“I was careful with Doll.” Hezekiel swallowed hard. “You said I wasn’t mature enough to be a parent.”

Salathiel sobbed harder.

“He’s carrying twins at least, maybe more.” Cunobelinus kissed Salathiel’s head. “He introduced us to his husband. I’m not sure what animal he was, but I certainly wouldn’t want to mess with him when he gets angry. But he was just curious tonight.”

“Doll is pregnant? By the idiot?”

“You didn’t know?” Salathiel looked up.

“I was taking your advice and leaving him alone.”

Cunobelinus nodded. “Best cut the bad out quickly.”

Hezekiel wiped his face. “But I still want him every day. Penelope and I are dating again and she keeps the ache at bay, but even when I was laying beside her, it never really went away. I just have ached so long, I can ignore it.”

“My son.” Salathiel pulled Hezekiel down for a hug. “I’m so sorry we messed you up.”

“You’re perfect, Salathiel, Cunobelinus. I’m the wreck.”

But his parents held him and understood his pain and that was enough for now.


	7. Seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steele has to sit though something important to other people.

  
Steele got up from his seat and picked up his books. Class was finally out for the week. He packed everything in his backpack and headed outside. His friends were waiting in the quad.

Gabe grinned. “Coming out with us?”

“Going home to my husband.”

Jareth, Steele’s clubbing friend, shook his head. “I still can’t see you as married.”

“You can see me being all domestic tonight if you stop by Darcie's. I’m taking Dal out tonight.”

“Then clubbing?”

Steele shook his head. “I went clubbing for the sex. Now I don’t have to squeeze into tight pants and dance up a sweat to get some.”

“Doesn’t he like dancing?”

Steele thought about it. “You know, I never asked.”

“See if he wants to come out tonight.”

Steele shook his head. “We both got summons to some demon hearing. It’s probably going to suck up our entire weekend.”

“It probably will,” said Ash. “The students and faculty want to get to the bottom of this Hezekiel thing. Was he lying? Mistaken? Right both times? If it can happen to him, it could happen to Akakios.”

Gabe clapped them on the back. “You know Akakios is right about you.”

“I know, but…”

“Bene can tell Akakios belongs to you. He can smell it. His uncles are coming. They can smell even better than he can.”

“Demons can do that?” Then why hadn’t Hezekiel got some help?

“Only a few and they’re expensive.”

Well that explained it. “No one better think Dal is going back to that fleabag.”

“Harsh, man.” Jareth shook his head.

“He deserves it. Dal is my husband. He’s carrying my kids. He wants to stay with me.”

“No one is going to force Dal to do anything.” Gabe rubbed Steele’s shoulder. “Demons aren’t monsters.”

Steele sighed. “No more than any other species.” He spotted Dal. “Except for cats. Cats are always up to no good. Especially the little ones.”

Dal laughed and stepped into his arms. “You found out my secret. I’ll have to strap you to the bed and torture you all night.”

“I’m at your mercy.” He held out his hands, palms down. “Gabe, where are those handcuffs?”

Gabe pulled some out of his pocket. “I’d loan them to you, but I plan on using them on Bene tonight.”

Jareth fake gagged. He wasn’t into bondage play.

Bene and Akakios arrived. Steele filled Dal in on the little he knew of the demon hearing and turned to the demons. “Can you tell us what to expect?”

The demons didn’t know much more than Steele did, except that even with it held in the biggest building on campus, hundreds more people than would fit wanted to attend, especially the law makers and religious types. So although they’d meet at the coliseum, the hearing was going to be held in a hearing room in the demon realm that could get bigger each time a person was added.

Steele wasn’t sure he cared for that. “What happens if…” He stopped himself. He didn’t want to scare Dal.

“We’ve got your back.” Bene exchanged nods with Gabe. “You and Dal will leave with the rest of us.”

Akakios snorted. “It’s Hezekiel who should be worried. If he lied about being Mated…”

Ash stepped into his arms. “I’m more worried he was mistaken.”

“I know, baby, I know.”

Dal wanted to know about the venue, mostly about access to the restrooms, and Bene and Akakios said that the restroom would be brought to him and then attempted to explain what they meant.

Jareth nodded at Dal. “Isn’t he a little small for you? Not your usual type. Don’t you ever worry about hurting him?”

Dal was perfect. Just because he didn’t look like most of the men Steele bumped uglies with, didn’t make him less than everything Steele desired. But… on the rare occasions when Steele and Jareth hadn’t found other partners, or found only unsatisfying one, they had taken pleasure in each other. “Sorry, dude. I’m now off limits.”

Dal took Steele’s hand and looked up at him. Steele squeezed his hand. “Ready for dinner?”

“Gabe and Bene are going to meet us in the dorm lobby tomorrow morning and we’ll all walk together.” Dal waited until they were outside hearing range to change the subject. “Was that an ex?”

“A fuck buddy when we couldn’t find anyone better.”

“And you’ve found someone better?”

“Yes, husband mine.”

Dal grinned. Tonight would be fantastic.

~~~~~

The hearing was more of a court and it was huge. The people at the back were just a blur, although the bailiff had reassured them that everyone could see as if they were in the eighth row.

Steele and Dal were in the witness box along with Lope, Hezekiel and his parents and ten other people Steele had never met. They had enough room that Dal didn’t have to sit anywhere near Hezekiel. One of Hezekiel’s parent’s eyes followed Dal. The box was both close to the judge, Professor Onesimus in this case, and not. People could see in the front of the box, but anything they did would not interrupt the court or get in the line of sight of the people behind them. They could pace, get up to eat or use the bathroom, and talk as long as they used quiet voices.

The hearing convened with the bang of a gong. The audience quieted and faced the judge. He explained why they were all there, most of which Steele didn’t understand. Mistaking a Mate or lying about one had far reaching implications to these people.

Steele respected their beliefs, but just wanted to get on with it.

First Hezekiel was call to the stand. He talked about meeting Dal for the first time, the joy he’d felt, his immaturity.

Dal’s turn came next. Professor Onesimus was nicer asking him questions. He had come to the university through a scholarship, without friends or money. Hezekiel’s claiming of him finally gave him a home, but a home like no one would want. He didn’t skimp of the details of Hezekiel’s misdeeds, or gloss over any wrongs. He was on the stands so long that when he came back, he went straight to the restroom.

By the time he was out, Lope had given her brief statement. Hezekiel was called again, speaking about meeting Lope and casting Dal out. He tried to go on, but Professor Onesimus cut him off, saying he’d have a chance to speak again.

Steele was next. Dal squeezed his hand as he left the witness box.

The professor was matter of fact. Steele explained his part: talking to Dal, getting the toys from Gabe, all the way to figuring out Lope was Hezekiel’s new Mate. When Steele stepped back in the witness box, Lope was holding one of Dal’s hands, and Hezekiel’s paler parent the other.

They both got up and let Steele hold his husband.

Lope went next, Hezekiel again. Steele went back to talk about the wedding. That stirred up the audience, but not as much as saying that Dal was carrying his babes.

Again when Steele returned, Hezekiel’s paler parent was offering Dal support. Hezekiel’s parents were called next, the dark one than the lighter. The lighter one, Salathiel, seemed to be from a different ethnic group, which agitated the crowd and that made Steele more sympathetic to them.

The child wasn’t the parent, nor the parent the child. He didn’t want his children discriminated against because Steele had stolen a demon’s Mate or that Dal had been one.

One of the demons Steele didn’t know spoke, then a break was called so experts could talk to Hezekiel, Dal, and Lope.

After seeing his husband off, Steele sat down by Salathiel. “One of thing reasons Hezekiel’s actions hurt so much is because Dal was raised a prisoner in his own home.” Steele gave a brief description of Dal’s parents and their living conditions. “Hezekiel couldn't have known, but he was recreating the conditions Dal’s parents had risk everything to free him from.”

Salathiel was in tears. “My son, my horrible son.”

Cunobelinus petted his hand.

“Now,” Steele cleared his throat. “I’m not telling you this to hurt you. I need your help.”

Salathiel looked up.

“I can see you care a lot. And you care for Dal. Is there anyone, might you know anyone, who could rescue his parents?”

Salathiel took Steele’s hand. “We’ll do anything you need.”

“Bring his parents back before his babies are born.” Steele sent them a grin. “Give him a reason to think well of you, and you just might find yourself being a grandparent to a few kittens.”

The look on Salathiel’s face said Steele had done the right thing.


	8. Eight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hezekiel doesn't like other people in his business, even if they think it's their business. But maybe he'll like the result.

  
Hezekiel was asked question after question by two of the experts, but the third only sniffed him.

After the hearing convened again, the first expert insisted that Hezekiel was Mated only to Doll, but that Doll was no longer bonded with him, something she’d never experienced before. The second expert said that since the bonding failed, at least on Doll’s side, there was no true bonding. But that Hezekiel was bonded with Penelope.

The third expert, the sniffer, claimed Hezekiel was still bonded to both, and fairly equally. Although Doll’s bond had been stronger due to its age, it had grown weak now that Hezekiel was no longer being fed.

Then it was Doll’s turn to say anything he hadn’t been asked, but that he thought needed telling. He was happily married and thrilled about the babies and glad Hezekiel had allowed him to find happiness elsewhere.

Hezekiel hadn’t allowed any of it. Doll was his, would always be his. Those babies should be his.

Lope spoke about being happy with Hezekiel and glad the ‘other man’ was her friend and that Doll was super cute.

The Hezekiel took the stand. He’d meant to stay strong, but Professor Onesimus asked leading questions and Hezekiel was forced to give honest answers. He tried to keep from crying as he spoke of the emptiness in his heart, but the hard faces of the audience sapped his strength. The bailiff had to help him back to the witness box.

A few more people spoke about the implications of each way of ruling. No one was really going to have Hezekiel killed for his foolishness? Were they?

Finally Onesimus called another break. Why was Salathiel talking so animatedly to Doll. And why were they putting their hand on Doll’s stomach? Hezekiel made himself calm down. If those kittens were Hezekiel’s, Salathiel would have done the same thing.

The dinner break was a short one. Before Hezekiel was more than half full, Onesimus called them back to order. He decided, first that Hezekiel hadn’t lied to Doll, but neither had he been mistaken. Doll had been Hezekiel’s Mate just as much as Lope was now, and if Hezekiel had been a little quicker in thinking or slower in acting, he might now be the first double mated demon in recorded history.

He spoke some more, but Hezekiel didn’t hear it. Two Mates. Two. He might have had both Doll and Penelope in his life. In his bed. He was an idiot.

The hearing was adjourned for all except a select few. Professor Onesimus was now going to tell them how to live their lives.

Onesimus, Steele, Doll, Hezekiel’s parents, Hezekiel, and Penelope sat in a circle of desks, none more grand than the others. Maybe a classroom. The professor had a stuffed bear. The person who held it got to speak. The bailiff moved it person to person.

Doll chose to speak first. “I have been hurt badly, in a way that was uniquely painful to me. I cannot see myself being able to be friendly with him, let alone be bound to him for my happiness. Although I respect the sacred idea of Mates, but I do not chose to be one with Hezekiel.”

Ouch. Doll was his, though, like it or not.

“Never?” asked Onesimus.

Doll rubbed his growing belly. “I might be willing to give it a try in a decade or two. For now I wish to concentrate on my new family.”

“Understandable.”

No, it wasn’t.

“But, will you demand no interactions, or will not having to be civil be enough?”

Doll thought about that one. Seeing him lost in thought, holding the bear over his bulging belly, made the ache in Hezekiel stronger. Those should be his young and the bear a gift from him.

“I have made friend with Pen,” Doll nodded her way, “and as she’s Mated with Hezekiel, I’ll be seeing him at times, but I do not wish to act like his husband. I already have one, which is enough for me.”

He passed the bear back to the bailiff. Penelope took the bear only long enough to say that she planned to live Mated with Hezekiel—as she should—and that she wanted to hear from the other people before she had her final say.

What was she up to?

Salathiel asked for the bear and spoke directly to Doll. “I’ll do what I can for your parents…”

What was that about?

“But although I will never give up until there is no hope left, do you think… we might…”

Cunobelinus took the bear from Salathiel’s grasp. “What they mean is: we’ll stand in for grandparents’ duties until your parents can take their rightful place.”

Doll nodded, his eyes full of tears. Steele passed him a tissue.

Where were Doll’s parents? Why did his parents know and he didn’t? Doll was his Mate. And most important, why was Salathiel, who minced no words telling Hezekiel just how much they hated being a parent, want to be anyone’s grandparent? Especially the grandparent of children who weren’t even Hezekiel’s?

Although, since Doll was still his Mate, the children were his, blood or no blood.

When Steele took the bear, Onesimus asked leading questions, but leading where?

“And what is the direct effect of this on you?”

Steele level his gaze at Onesimus, the highly respected professor and expert in his field, as if he were just another of the idiot’s friends acting dumb. “What you’re asking is whether I feel I owe Hezekiel anything because I married one who had been, or still is, his Mate?

Onesimus grinned. “And your answer?”

Steele took a long look at Doll then Hezekiel and turned back to Onesimus. “I have thought Doll was beautiful from the moment I saw him. We weren’t paired up in dance class because he was the shortest and I was the tallest student, but during the times we could pair up ourselves, he was always the first on my list.”

Doll blushed.

“But when I couldn’t have him, I was known for clubbing and most of the men I had sex with look more like Hezekiel. If I have to make amends for quote stealing his Mate, and my husband agrees, I am willing to have sex with him. I heard he has feathered wings. I’m partial to feathers, and wings gives men such great chests.”

Hezekiel sunk in his chair and wrapped his arms around himself. He should have exercised his wings. Penelope grinned at him and tittered. She knew what his sorry chest looked like. She also been hoping the wings would have put muscles on him too. Such superficial people.

Onesimus pointed the bailiff to Doll. “And will you agree to this?”

Steele refused to give up the bear. “I will not allow you to pressure him into a decision in front of an audience or as a requirement to go home. We’re all tired. A forced concession is not one I’ll honor.”

Onesimus nodded as if backtalk was allowed. “Your point is well made. We should wrap this up and come back… in a week.”

But nothing was set. Although he didn’t want anyone running his life or making choices for him, he still needed to know what Onesimus decided for everyone else.

Penelope held out her hand for the bear.

“If Hezekiel gets to have sex with Steele, I should too.”

Steele sighed and stared up at the ceiling. “I am not having sex with you.”

Penelope laughed. “I knew you’d say that, but I had to try. What I really want is your baby.”

Hezekiel shot to his feet. She was his Mate, his acknowledge Mate and here she was asking for another man’s child.

A hand on his shoulder motioned him back into his seat. He shrugged it off and sat. That wasn’t going to happen. That wouldn’t happen if the idiot was the last man in all the realms and children with Penelope was the only way to revive existence!

Penelope grinned at Hezekiel as if she hadn’t just scooped his heart out with a fork. “I love you, Hez, but I’ve wanted a child with Steele as long as I can remember. Just one. The rest will be yours. I promise.”

Hezekiel wiped his face. “We’ll discuss this after you graduate.”

He could talk her out of it in the next three years.

“We all have a lot to discuss.” Onesimus took back the bear. “Anything else need to be said today? Then we will adjourn until next Saturday.”

He stood up.

Steele hopped over to Doll and helped him to his feet. “If I’d known we had time to discuss things, I would have brought up the fuck buddy thing with you first.”

Doll looked the idiot over. Steele got down on his knees. “I owe you for this. And I’m sorry. But if this will keep his hands off you, him out of your life…”

Cunobelinus stepped up behind Hezekiel. “That’s the way to do it. Apologize before they can get properly angry. That one’s an expert.”

Hezekiel couldn’t stand this room anymore, these people, his life. He turned and marched out. Was Steele telling the truth about the sex, or did he want some variety and this way he was doing it for Doll? Hezekiel could use that. And what was Penelope thinking? She wasn’t having anyone’s babies but his.

Hezekiel got caught in the corridor behind several old demons, who were all super slow and clogging the path. One said in an old scratchy voice, “But does that mean the young Steele special?”

"It means the bonds were weak," put in a bald one.

"Why not both," answered a third. "He's got to be a wizard at least, even though he denies it."

"Wizards are everywhere," said the bald one. "If he is just a wizard, he isn't special."

"But he can't be compelled by Demon magic," said the first. "That makes him unusual at least."

“And if young Steele isn’t special, could other,” the fourth demon cleared his throat, “wizards, familiars and the like, steal our Mates. Could my son always be alone because someone has seduced away his Mate before they had a chance to meet?”

“No. Young Hezekiel’s bonds must be weak.”

“Because he has two?”

“Do we all have two? And just never meet the second?”

“If we all have two, we all might have more. Then our Mates are not special, neither to us individually or to demon kind as a whole.”

The others gasped. That was sacred ground. Mates were one of the things that made Demons superior. Demons were breed though the perfect choice of a higher power or the justice of the universe, depending on one’s theology, but everyone knew that their Mate was perfect for them no matter how many lovers they had before, or kept after their Mating. If they needed other lovers, their Mate would be good with that.

Which Penelope was, even if she wanted a piece of the idiot too.

Now if these great respected gossips wouldn’t spread word of his humiliation far and wide, he might learn to stop hating what he’d made of his life, but neither was likely to happen.

~~~~~~

Hezekiel strode up to Steele dorm, striving to hide his nervousness. Doll was in the lobby, his hand on Steele’s arm. “I expect you to have him home by seven.”

“Seven? That’s hardly time for—”

Doll cut Hezekiel off. Steel grinned down at Doll, but hid it when Doll turned to him and straightened his shirt collar.

“I want you to have a good time.”

“Yes, dear.”

“Condoms are a must.”

“Of course.” Steele pulled out a string of them. How many did he think they’d need? Hezekiel got hard just thinking about it.

“And be back by seven.”

“Seven on the dot.”

“Not a moment after.”

“Yes, dear.”

“And take a shower as soon as you’re home.”

“Your wish, my love.”

“And remember who here is your husband.”

“As ever, husband mine.”

“And… And I love you.”

Steele kissed Doll’s hand. “You are the one I love.”

Doll stood on tiptoes to reach Steele’s mouth. Then he patted Steele on the back. Steele grinned as he led Hezekiel to the door. “He’s so cute and possessive.”

“Are you sure he’s okay with this?”

Steele scratched his chin. “I got the idea from him in the first place. He was wondering what I’d think of your skills.”

Yet another punch to the gut. Hezekiel hadn’t had that many lovers. Two to be exact. He’d wanted to save it for his Mate. Steele was known far and wide for his superior skills. People had stopped him many times in the last weeks, a few to taunt him for his inability to keep two Mates, or his luck to have two in the first place, but most of them to say that they would give anything to take his place on these copulation visits.

His count was now at twenty-two men who thought Hezekiel was the luckiest man alive and almost forty more who had just called him lucky.

Hezekiel didn’t feel lucky.

Steele stopped in the quad. “What first? I normally have something in common with men I have sex with. We play video games, drink together, dance together, that sort of thing. I’ve never just fallen into bed—or against the wall—with a guy before.”

“I’d hoped to go to dinner.”

The idiot laughed. “Get to know each other?”

“What’s wrong with that?” Hezekiel crossed his arms. “Doll doesn’t want us to be friends?”

The idiot looked him over. “Let’s grab some take out and go to your place. We can get to know each other there.”

Whatever. He let the idiot pick the food then made him carry it to Hezekiel’s apartment. As they ate, the idiot tried to find a book, game, or movie they had enjoyed, then one they both read, played, or seen. He sat back with a sigh. “Your turn.”

“I don’t see that we have anything in common.”

Steele licked his lips. He had no right to be this handsome. He was fat. Fat. And muscular, and his eyes shown out bright against his dark skin and the striped tips of his hair were hypnotizing. They hadn’t changed since Hezekiel first saw him, so they maybe they were natural.

“We both care about Dal.”

Hezekiel wiped his face. He couldn't take this. He didn't want to be vulnerable, but he was so weak, so lost. "I ache without him."

“But you care that he’s happy?”

“I want him to be happy with me,” Hezekiel struggled to keep his voice calm, “but since that can’t be, I’m glad he’s happy with you.”

That was a total lie.

Steele brushed a tear from Hezekiel’s cheek. “I can work with that.”

Steele leaned across the table and kissed Hezekiel. He wasn’t needy like Doll or hesitant like Penelope. Steele knew what he was about and was letting Hezekiel set the pace because Hezekiel was the inexperienced one.

Hezekiel pulled away. He didn’t want to be condescended to.

Steel grinned at him. “Not ready for that yet?”

“You’ve had sex with people against a wall?”

“Outside against a wall, inside against a door, in a hallway on the way to an apartment. I’m versatile.”

Hezekiel shot to his feet. He’d just had the worst thought. “You expect to top me.”

The idiot laughed. “Like I said. I’m versatile. And no dick needs to go inside anyone to have sex.”

“You don’t let Doll top you.”

The idiot snorted. “You don’t know what Dal and I get up to.”

“He only ever wanted to bottom.”

“For you. You kept him trapped, a prisoner. He was born into the house of the man who first imprisoned him. He gave you what he thought you wanted. What that man had wanted from him. What the men who ‘rescued’ him wanted.”

What was Doll’s life before Hezekiel? He’d never realized… He’d known Doll wasn’t a virgin, but he’d been so young. How many men had taken his Mate? Born into imprisonment… Hezekiel might never have met him.

Steele got down on his knees. “It’s okay.” He petted Hezekiel’s hair. “He’s safe now.”

Hezekiel sniffed. “And my parents are trying to find his?”

Steele nodded. He pulled out a tissue. Hezekiel took it and mopped up his face. Steele kissed him again and this time he didn’t pull away. Kissing Steele was almost like kissing Doll if he ignored his physical senses. Steele’s soul was so bound to Doll’s that magically one was like the other.

He let the spirit flow between them and only came back to himself on the cold kitchen floor with Steele skin to skin beside him. Steele kissed Hezekiel’s shoulder and gently squeezed his privates. “May I?”

“What?” Had Hezekiel missed something?

“May I take you to the other side?”

Hezekiel nodded and wrapped his arms around Steele. And Steele sent him over: higher, faster, better than he’d ever gone.

No wonder so many people called Hezekiel lucky.


	9. Nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steele reassures his husband.

Steele was out of the shower before Dal got back to their room. Dal tried to pretend like nothing was different. Steele wrapped his arms gently around. “I love you.”

Dal buried his face in Steele’s shoulder. Steele petted his back. “Harder than you thought?”

Dal nodded without looking up.

“Do you want me to tell you about it?”

“No!” Dal pulled away, but he didn’t go far. “Yes. Maybe?”

“He’s not as good at sex as you are. If he starts thinking, he freezes up. I have a feeling that the next time, if there is one, will be a lot harder on all of us.”

Dal snorted. “You think.”

He sighed. “How did you finally break the ice?”

“I made him cry.”

Dal glared at him. Steele laughed and pulled Dal close. “It’s hard to stay mad at a guy who’s crying over how much he hurt you.”

“Over how much he hurt himself.”

“Be that as it may.” Steele kissed his head. “But I opened a wound and filled it.”

“You filled it too much.” Dal covered his face. “I could feel you come. I could feel him. I don’t want to feel him anymore.”

Steele held Dal and passed down tissues. “I’m sorry.”

“No.” Dal sniffed. “Salathiel told me what it’s like for a demon to be apart from their Mate, even one they love and hate to equal degrees. He needs me even if I don’t want him. So now he needs you.”

“Husband mine,” Steele stroked his arm. “Tell me what you want.”

“I want you to take me to bed, then tell me how much more pleasure you get from me.”

Steele laughed. “I could tell you that now.”

“Objectively. After.”

“Your wish, my husband, is what my soul desires.”

Dal barked a laugh. “None of that. Objectively.”

So Steele set to work on his husband’s desire and it wasn’t hard to tick off the differences. “One, he doesn’t know what he’s doing. He fumbles a lot. Makes me feel sorry for Lope, only I guess she doesn’t know what she’s doing either.”

“Let her teach him.”

“Good idea.” Steele kissed Dal’s fingers. “Two, Like I said he thinks too much. He knows how things are ‘supposed to’ go and gets agitated when I don’t follow the script. He wanted to wine and dine me. I’m more of a beer and takeout pizza guy.”

“You like good foods.”

“I have no taste. Fried chicken tastes as good from a road-side stand, a fancy restaurant, or a box. Food is good.”

“You are a slut for food.” Dal laughed.

“I’ve been called that before. I prefer unpicky.”

Dal laughed. “I love you.”

“And I think what was most different.” Steele shifted so Dal could settle back against his side.

“Humm.”

“Is that I love you.”

“Good.”

“I’ve never had sex with anyone I’ve been in love with before. Or even had a crush on. You’ve made me feel the difference.”

“And Hez?”

“I feel sorry for him.”

“Really?”

“I mean, he had you and he gave you up. I’m not going to be that stupid.”

Dal rubbed his cheek against Steele’s chest. “My wonderful husband.”

“Yours.” Always and forever.

~~~~~

Steele spotted Hezekiel’s parents before they saw him. They were watching Dal. Steele came up behind them and said hi. Salathiel squeaked and put they hand over their heart. “I didn’t see you.”

He smiled at them. “Watching Dal?”

Cunobelinus shrugged. “Waiting for you. We have a few more questions about where Dal lived, but didn’t want to ask him without you to comfort him.”

The questions were much more specific than Steele could have imagined. Cunobelinus had pictures of the house Dal was raised in and in the corner of one was a tiny cat, who Dal was sure was his papa.

He cried so hard he couldn’t stay upright.

Salathiel took his hand. “We will find them. We will save them.”

Steele sure hoped that was true.


	10. Ten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hezekiel is again stupid, but Steele's chill.

Hezekiel opened his door for Steele. Why couldn’t they go out? Or even just meet in neutral territory? Hezekiel felt like a mistress who was supposed to be happy that her lover had bothered to darken her door at all. Might as well get the pleasantries over with. “Come in. How’s Doll?”

“He’s fine. How are you? Heard your TAing again.”

The nosy idiot. “Keeping track of me?”

Steele grinned. “Like I would any friend.”

They would never be friends. Steele had already said they wouldn’t. Might as well get this farce over with. Hezekiel pulled off his shirt. Steele’s hand moved across his chest. “You’ve been working out.”

Why did he always notice whatever Hezekiel didn’t want him to? 

Steele turned Hezekiel back by his chin. “No need to be shy.” Steele licked his lips. “May I see your wings?”

Hezekiel stepped back. “What’s so special about my wings?”

Steele cocked his head. “As a land based animal, I think all wings are special.”

And what animal would that be? Hezekiel wasn’t going to give Steele the satisfaction of asking. 

“But it’s okay to hold them back. I’m just curious.”

And give Steele the satisfaction of thinking he was shy, ashamed, or uncomfortable? Hezekiel spread his wings. Steele whistled, his eyes on the sooty feathers. “So beautiful. May I touch?”

Why would he want to?

Steele walked around Hezekiel, stroking feathers. He stopped at Hezekiel’s back and kissed his side of his neck, stirring the soft feathers at the edge of Hezekiel’s wings with his breath. “So very beautiful.”

And he leaned his hips against Hezekiel’s, showing off the evidence that he really believed that.

Then he continued his walk. Hezekiel spread out his wings and gave them a flap. He might have been practicing, but keeping his wings in one position still ached. 

“So many colors of grey and sliver.”

“Grey is grey.”

“Whoever told you that doesn’t know how to appreciate beauty.”

“Whatever.” But Hezekiel couldn’t help but keep his wings out. Even Lope hadn’t liked them this much. Steele liked his wings, not just wings.

“May I kiss you?”

“That’s what you’re here for.”

“If that’s only what I was here for, I’d have you on the table, with your wings spread wide and your legs wider.”

Hezekiel got hard just thinking about it. “What’s stopping you?”

“You don’t seem very happy to see me today.”

Hezekiel scowled. “You have to leave at seven again?”

Steele put his arms around Hezekiel’s waist. “Can’t decide whether you didn’t want me to come or you want me to stay forever.”

If Steele was going to bother to come at all, the least he could do was stay the night.

Steele lifted Hezekiel’s chin and kissed him. Hezekiel body wanted him so bad, needed him so much, at least the parts that linked Steele to Dal. 

But Hezekiel had been nothing but the butt of jokes since he’d spread his sooty little wings on the playground. And he’d been the brunt of taunts all week by demons that didn’t know Steele was a sex god, didn’t care. He may not have been a prefect demon, but even a half-breed like him was better than any human. “Kneel.”

Steele grinned. “Going down.”

He fell to his knees and mouthed Hezekiel though his sweatpants. The spell hadn’t worked. Hezekiel was getting what he wanted, but not in the way he wanted. “Obey.”

Steele snorted. “We haven’t come up with the rules to that game yet.”

“It’s not a game.” Hezekiel cast a spell the ripped Steele’s clothes from him then he tossed the naked man onto the table. He liked his idea even better.

Until the man became a bundle of spikes. That smelled. “Ew! What’s that?”

Steele dusted himself off. “That’s what I smell like when I’m upset. And we’d better take those quills out carefully and get ointment on you so there’s no infection.”

Hezekiel stepped back. “Just what are you?”

“Porcupine.”

“What!”

“You know, quills. Now let’s get them out before you scar your pretty face.”

“My face!” Hezekiel reached for his face, but Steele stopped him.

“Careful now. Mostly in your hands, arms, and chest, any place on you that touched me. But we’ll get them out.” And he set to work as if Hezekiel wasn’t the cause of this mess.

“Why are you being so nice to me?”

Steele grinned. “This is nice?”

“I was trying to force myself on you.”

Steele nodded like the idiot he was. “What was that nonsense about?”

“It wasn’t nonsense.” The quills in his hands hurt worse coming out then going in. “Everything smells so bad.”

“We’ll take a shower after you’re quill free and then I’ll cover everything in ointment.” Steele removed another quill. “I’m willing to go down on you or play any game you like. I’ve never been into BDSM, but then I’ve never had a steady boyfriend before.”

“You have a husband.”

“Dal had been forced to be submissive too much in his life to do more than joke about it.” One more quill came out. “You’re the boyfriend.”

Hezekiel wanted that so much to be true. “You said we were only going to be fuck buddies. No relationship.”

“I was wrong.” Steele kissed Hezekiel’s wrist and went to remove the quills further up his arm. 

Hezekiel snorted. “You’re never wrong. What are you getting out of this?”

“Having sex with you gives Dal peace, as opposed to guilt. But he’ll only reap the benefits of being bound to you, Mated, if I build up our relationship. Think of it this way. You and I build up this thing, maybe I won’t just spend the night sometime, but Dal will be with us.”

The pain was just too great. He couldn’t hold back his sobs. He was so stupid to have lost Doll in the first place and he was continuing to be stupid. He’d lose Steele too. Just watch, he’d patch Hezekiel up and then leave as the hole in Hezekiel’s soul got bigger.

Steele carefully wiped his tears. “There’s just something beautiful about you in tears.”

“You like it?” How could he, the sadist. But no matter how cruel Steele was, Hezekiel still wanted him, still needed him.

Steele laughed. “Dal will be laughing one minute, crying the next. Why do you think I keep tissues in my pockets? Mom says they’ll taper off once the kittens are born, but Dal cried a lot before the kittens too.” He shrugged. “I’ll just keep carrying tissues, which reminds me, I’ll need to borrow some of your clothes. My jacket and shoes are the only things that survived.”

“And you’re not upset?” He had to be upset. Anyone would be. What Hezekiel had tried to do was unacceptable, especially as Hezekiel was trying to make nice with Steele. 

“My curiosity is pretty strong.”

Really? Just to prove that wasn’t true, to force Steele away, to send him running, Hezekiel told him every detail of his horrible week and all those horrible people he met and had to interact with while trying to find his parents, who—now that he gave it some thought—were probably trying to find Doll’s parents, which would help Hezekiel in Doll’s eyes. Or would have if he hadn’t be horrible himself tonight.

Steele didn’t say anything for a while, then he kissed the spots on Hezekiel’s face where he’d removed the quills. “So you wanted to prove those fleabags right?”

Hezekiel hung his head. “Is that what I’m doing?”

The tears were coming again. Steele kissed them away. “A shower.”

Hezekiel let himself be led away, stripped, and put under the shower. Steele joined him. No one had ever soaped Hezekiel up before. Steele had magic hands. “You’re to come five times tonight.”

In two hours? In one now that he'd wasted the first? That was crazy. “Who decided that?”

“Dal. He can feel both of us come, when we’re together.”

“What?” Hezekiel froze. Doll could feel him now? Feel his pleasure? His pain too?

“Professor Onesimus thinks it’s because of our bonds. I just nod and pretend I know what’s going on. Anyway, you let yourself enjoy me five times, and I can stay until eleven, plus an hour more for each time you let yourself go.”

“So to stay until morning I’ll need to…” Six makes midnight, seven one. “That’s impossible.”

“Is that what you want, my pretty?” Steele’s hands were so wicked. “For me to wake you with a kiss? If you do, let yourself come.”

Hezekiel did. He also let himself go on the bed, against the table with his wing’s spread and Steele inside him, which he’d told himself he wasn’t going to do no matter how much he’d dreamed of it. Once was lying on his side with Steele’s gentle breaths in his ear. Once was Steele’s mouth on him, once just hands. 

Not enough. Hezekiel buried his face in the pillow to hide the tears. “You going?”

Steele laughed. How did he have the energy for that? “You’re at seven, so I have a few more hours.”

“Seven?” Hezekiel counted them on his fingers and got to six. 

Steele added one more that Hezekiel might have been able to remember.

Hezekiel lay back. “What about you?”

“Two, but tonight isn’t about me. It’s about not thinking of yourself as a mix-breed demon with sooty wings and a weak bond and only the pride of demonhood holding you up.”

That was Hezekiel all over.

“Tonight you’re a beautiful angel, cloaked in silver, strengthening the bond with one of your two Mates in a way no demon has done before. You are special, beautiful, and mine.” Steele kissed his stomach. “Besides you’re reading the clock wrong. It’s only nine, and I’m sure I can drag one out of you an hour.”

“What about you?”

Steele grinned. “If you’re game to trying to get me off with your wings alone, I wouldn’t object.”

Hezekiel finally succeeded but only after Steele got him off twice more. He wasn’t going to win this game, but trying was fun.

He fell asleep at some point. Steele woke him up with a kiss. It was morning, but only barely. Steele’s hands were warm and strong. “We have five minutes to get you off, or I’ll have to go home.”

Hezekiel was too tired for this. “Idiot.”

Steele laughed. “Would you be happy after all this effort, for me to leave now?”

“The effort was fun.” He opened his eyes wider. “Is Doll okay?”

“He’s staying with friends. He won't admit it, but he wants you to win this as bad as I do.”

Hezekiel wiped his eyes. Tears were coming again. So close, but hope was bleeding him dry. “Then why didn’t you wake me sooner?’

“Because,” Steele grinned. “I can get you off in four minutes.”

“You can’t.”

He did and to prove his prowess, he got Hezekiel off one more time before letting him go back to sleep. 

Hezekiel woke again with Steele hard at his back. “Are you ever soft?” 

“Maybe, but it hasn’t happened yet when I’m in bed with a beautiful man.”

“Idiot.”

Steele laughed. “Breakfast or more sex?”

Hezekiel turned toward the clock. “How much time do we have?”

“Enough for both.”

“Then food first.”

They had a simple breakfast and slipped back into bed, but Hezekiel had come so many times in the last, what was it, twelve hours, it just didn’t appeal. Steele held him and whispered silly things in his ear. He pushed Steele away, but he didn’t go far. Hezekiel put his chin on his hands and watched him. “What do you see in me?”

Steele swished away the hairs that had fallen into Hezekiel’s face. “More than you see in yourself.”

“I get that part.”

“I’m the part of Dal that was missing, the part which meant he couldn’t be happy with you, but as your Mate, he can’t truly be happy without you.”

Hezekiel hid his face. 

“Besides, who’s going to keep Dal busy when you’re with Lope? You know how horny he is.”

Hezekiel bit his lip. “That’s you. How do you see me?”

He had to know. His mind and body were at peace in a way he’d never know before and he’d lose that feeling the moment Steele left. 

Steele kissed his nose. “You’re a child in a man’s body, resting your self-worth in the wrong people. You need better friends.”

So true. But how was he to get them when the people he cared about didn’t want him? Doll, his parents, his supposed childhood friends. And this whole two Mate thing was enough to keep the demons who weren’t bullies from ever trying to get to know him. He should just stop hoping.

Steele tugged Hezekiel's face back up. "I see you as the other father to Dal's children. I see you helping out not because you know that'll make some of the next litter half demons, but because they'll be so small and cute and you love the man who carried them. And maybe me too. You should love me because I'm adorable."

Hezekiel rolled his eyes and hid his smile. “Idiot.”

Steele grinned, “Just the way you want me.”


	11. Eleven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steele's parents ask too many questions.

  
Steele sat in the diner across from Mom while Dad helped Dal with the order. Steele had wanted to help, but Dad overruled him, which meant either that Dad really liked Dal or, more likely, that Mom wanted to talk to Steele.

“So what’s this about a demon I’ve been hearing about?”

The second then.

“What do you what to know?” Where was he even going to start?

“Everything.”

Steele glanced at Dal. “Some of it isn’t my story to tell.”

“The part that has to do with you.”

“I’m now part of a… complex marriage.” Onesimus had explained it, but Steele still couldn’t figure out how it worked. “It’s for political reasons.”

“What do you have to do with politics?”

“Demon politics. Or theology or something.”

Mom rubbed her forehead. “What does this have to do with you?”

“I love Dal.” He couldn’t also say he’d started having feeling for Hezekiel when he was so newly married to Dal. And that maybe he only had them because he loved Dal so much. Demon theology was confusing.

“And?”

“Most demons think Dal belongs to a demon named Hezekiel. I married Dal and am having children with him even knowing this, so I need to give him something in return.” The giving was getting easier each time and not just because Dal had started looking forward to feeling the back flow of his Mating bond. One of these days he was going to come and watch. After that, it was just a matter of time before he’d join it.

“What are you giving him? Most demons? Like half? Why would they care?”

Steele used this as an opportunity to get into the minutia of demon beliefs and he was still talking when Dal and Dad arrived. The subject switched to the babies, when they were coming, how likely each were to be what species of familiar, whether one might be a wizard like one of Dad’s Uncles. Steele wasn’t sure if that Uncle was related to him by blood or one of many family friends who may or may not have married into the family.

When Dal waddled off to the restroom at the end of the meal, Mom shot Steele laser eyes. “You. A demon. What?”

Dad raised his eyebrows.

“Since many demons believe that Dal should have married Hezekiel…”

“Not the same Hezekiel Lope is engaged to, right?” Dad was following along too well.

“Yes, the same one. She’s going to marry him, like she wants.”

Mom nodded.

Steele got a text from Dal. “How long should I stay gone?”

Steele texted back, “rescue me”

“And?” prompted Mom.

“Even though Hezekiel has Lope, I still owe him for taking Dal. To appease the demons who think those two should be together.” So clinical when what he wanted was his men tucked against him. His men. He’d need to go over that with Dal before he sprung it on Hezekiel.

The poor demon still didn’t understand what Steele saw in him.

“But how are you going to pay him back? Hello, Dal. Ready to go?”

Dal laughed and let Steele help him into a light sweater. “Steele is too shy to tell you, that for legal reasons, as well as personal one, Steele is almost as married to Hez and he is to me.”

Mom’s jaw dropped, but Dad grinned. “Is he good looking, son?”

“Tolerably,” supplied Dal, with just the touch of a grin. “And somehow Pen has got everyone to agree that she’ll carry at least one of Steele’s babies.”

Steele shuddered.

Mom waved his concerns away. “She’s wanted to catch your eye for ages.”

Steele ground his teeth. “Mom, that isn’t helping. Dal, do you need a hand?”

Dal had put his hand over his belly, like he had on and off for months, but this time his pale face was paler than normal. “I think I’m all right.”

Steele lifted Dal up. “Mom, can you get Grandma Aella? I’d feel more comfortable with her here.”

That was impossible. Mom and Dad had come to visit to try and convince Dal to give birth at their house. Grandma Aella was still at home.

Steele carried Dal across the quad while Dal whisper, “I’m not ready. I’m not ready.”

“It okay, Baby.” Steele set him gently on a bench. “Turn cat and it will get easier.’

“No!” Dal pushed Steele away then clutched his belly. “Not yet. Not yet.”

Feet sounded behind him. Steele turned. Salathiel was rushing over. Steele held out his hands. “Dal’s in labor and fighting every contraction, Grandma Allea still at home hours ago. And he won’t turn cat.”

Arms wrapped around Steele. “Sweet little papa,” Salathiel soothed. “Leave everything to us.”

“I can’t take him home like this!” Steele was helpless. The babies were weeks early. They couldn’t be born in his dorm if Dal refused to turn cat. What if he bled to death?

“Pick him up.”

Steele did. Bloody water was spurting down Dal’s legs.

A hand grabbed his arm. “Take one step. Yes, that’s right. One more. Hold still. Now set him on the floor.”

Steele looked around. He was in a well decorated house with plush carpets and someone had spread a blanket on the floor. “Please.”

“Now set him down.”

Steele did.

Two very small cats nosed Dal. Steele's first thought was to move them away, but maybe they could convince Dal to turn cat. “Dal, you can do it. Let go and you’ll be a cat. The pain will be less.”

“No, no, no!” Dal curled around himself. “I can’t.”

“Sure you can,” said Grandma Aella. “Help me get his clothes off.”

Steele spared a glance for whoever had brought her. Hezekiel. Steele nodded and got to work.

Even naked and covered in a blanket Dal refused to changed. Hezekiel got down on one knee. “Doll, why can’t you change?”

“I’m so small.” Dal gasped and clutched his belly. “Baby porcupines can weight two pounds. As a cat, I just over four. I’ll die.”

Grandma Aella laughed. “My sweet pet. You’re carrying kittens, not porcupettes. And there are four. That’s why you’re so large. They’re all really tiny. They’ll need a lot of love and care. You’ll have to be a cat to give them what they need.”

And then all the sudden Dal was a tiny cat with a round belly and the first little kitten showed itself. Grandma and the two cats had this.

Steele leaned back on his heels and took Hezekiel’s hand without looking away from Dal. “Thank you.”

Hezekiel squeezed his hand. Steele brought Hezekiel’s hand to his lips. A second kitten was born. Dal cleaned it and with the help of the others, positioned it to nurse.

His babies were being born. Steele felt all wobbly. He got on his knees again, but with his back against Hezekiel’s legs, and let Hezekiel hold him up.

The third kitten came, followed quickly by the four.

“Identical,” announced Grandma Aella. “No wonder that third one confused me.”

“Four.”

Hezekiel squeezed his shoulders. “If you ever need another set of hands.”

Steele sighed. “I’m sure we’ll find a way to keep yours busy.”

Then Dal meowed at Steele and he curled up on a new blanket with his husband against his chest and his family sucking happily. What more could a man ask for?

~~~~~~

Steele woke to tiny peeps. Hezekiel manage to look about to bolt while lying on the carpet. He bit his lip. “Dal told me to lay here.”

“We do what Dal says.”

_You better._

“Always, my love.”

Dal licked one kitten and brought it over and laid it in the small place between Steele’s and Hezekiel’s faces. Hezekiel moved away. Dal swatted him. He stared at the kitten with wide eyes. “What am I supposed to do?”

“What about…?” Steele carefully put out his hand and petted the tiny kitten with one finger. The kitten peeped in protest. Steele laughed. “Are you our first, princess?”

Dal butted against Hezekiel’s hand. Hezekiel carefully laid his hand over the tiny kitten’s back. “She’s so cold.”

_She’s fine._

Dal picked that kitten up and put it back in the pile against Steele’s chest. He place the second where the first had been. Steele held out his hand for Dal to sniff before touching the kitten. “And this one’s Dva, right?”

“Dava and…” Hezekiel gestured to the kitten pile with his chin, his hand being busy petting the second kitten. Dva yawned and snuggled into Hezekiel’s hand.

“Jeden. But they’ll all get new names once their personalities shine through.”

“What’s a good name that means sleepy?” Hezekiel was sure enough now to protest Dva being woken up to be taken back to the kitten pile.

The third, despite his tiny size and closed eyes tried to get back to his brother until his brother was brought to him. “Tri and štyri.”

“Tree and… Say that again.”

Steele laughed. “I’m not sure I got it right the first time. Sheteery?”

Dal blinked his eyes.

“We bow to your greater knowledge.”

Dal sighed. Close enough.

It wasn’t but Steele was willing to be corrected several dozen times until he got it right.

“You know.” Hezekiel gave the fourth kitten one last pet before Dal took him away. “These kittens are technically mine as well, socially, so they will all have to have demon names as well as these and whatever they are called later.”

Steele covered his face. “I’m leaving that to you.”

Hezekiel laughed. He didn’t do that enough. Steele tugged him forward and kissed him. Dal started piling the babies against Hezekiel’s chest. Steele sat up. “I guess it’s your turn for Daddy duty.”

“Food’s in the kitchen.”

Grandma Aella was in the kitchen too, and despite the evidence of his own eyes, Grandma Aella said the birth went well.

“But all that blood.”

“Amniotic liquid. It’s there to remind to remind you men that no matter who the carrying parent is, having a woman who knows what she’s doing around is what’s best for everyone.”

“True, Grandma Aella.” Steele kissed her hands.

Steel got hugs from Hezekiel’s parents and curious glances from the two shy cats. There was a story there, but that could wait until later. All Steele wanted to do was be with his family.

He slid back against the couch, but closer to Hezekiel this time. He could kiss him without much trouble and their knees touched. In the space between their bellies, their family lay, the babies eating or sleeping and Dal purring.

As Steele was dozing off again, Hezekiel laughed. “I just had the worst thought. Penelope is going to be so jealous that she missed this.”

_She can come tomorrow._

“Your wish, my love.”

“And when her baby comes it’s not going to be quite this tidy.”

Steele groaned. “As long as it’s not my baby.”

“She’ll wear you down eventually.”

“Nope, unless it’s with that spell where the parents don’t have to be in the same room to conceive.”

Hezekiel yawned. “I vote for that. Doll is generous enough to share you with me, but between the two of us and four kittens, probably more by the time she graduates, I don’t think we should spread you any thinner.”

Steele groaned. “She can have your kid first.”

“I second that. Doll? And the ruling passed unanimously.”

They kept up the silly talk until they fell asleep. Steele woke to Lope watching over them. She knew not to try to touch the kittens, so Steele went back to sleep. Once the babies were a little older, he wouldn’t be getting any. And really what more could he asked for but to have the ones he loved so close.

 

 

 

 


End file.
